Influences

Martin Buber (1878-1965)

Every person born into this world represents something new, something that never existed before, something original and unique. ...Every [hu]man’s foremost task is the actualization of [her] his unique, unprecedented and never-recurring potentialities, and not the repetition of something that another, and be it even the greatest, has already achieved.

“The same idea was expressed by Rabbi Zusya when he said, a short while before his death: ‘In the world to come I shall not be asked: “Why were you not Moses?” I shall be asked: ‘Why were you not Zusya?'

-Martin Buber, The Way of Man, 1948

Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941)

THE EVENING was lonely for me, and I was reading a book till my heart became dry, and it seemed to me that beauty was a thing fashioned by the traders in words. Tired I shut the book and snuffed the candle. In a moment the room was flooded with moonlight.

Spirit of Beauty, how could you, whose radiance overbrims the sky, stand hidden behind a candle's tiny flame? How could a few vain words from a book rise like a mist, and veil her whose voice has hushed the heart of earth into ineffable calm?

-Rabindranath Tagore, Lover's Gift, Verse 56, 1918

Also

Mae West, Langston Hughes, Isabel Toledo, Hank Aaron, Kate Tempest,

and the New York City Subway.

Acknowledgements

My thanks to:

Robert Lucy who photographed me in garments I've made. He brings the eye of a painter to his work behind the camera.

The talented Jessica Robinson directed, filmed and edited the Conscientious Consumer videos. Though her schedule is full to the brim, she made filming an unhurried joy.

Additional photo credit: Beth Ruddock (rain coat/rain hat photo)

Collaborating with these artists is one of the great pleasures of this project.