Trance Witness Revels, this is William Klein’s subtitle for his groundbreaking book on New York City of 1954/55.

It is a poetic alteration of a standard New York tabloid headline of the period, Chance Witness Reveals. 

That is the way I look at the world when I photograph. I had a great deal of practice in this type of heightened

seeing even before I took up photography seriously in the early 80s. During my 3 years in the Army Medical

Corps, ‘65 to ‘68, I used to wander around outside my hospital bases in Denver, Colorado; San Antonio, Texas;

and finally, Yokohama, trying to mentally absorb the visual details of these unfamiliar places. In Tokyo in 1980, I

was introduced to color photography by the brilliant, dynamic Austrian photographer, Hans Fleischner and

soon joined him and a fellow student, the amazing Kazuko Yajima, in presenting our work in slide show format

set to music in public and private spaces all over the city. This in turn led to contacts, film company

sponsorship, exhibitions, and the inclusion of my photographs in various Japanese publications. I have

continued to use the slide show format up through the present day although the images from the slide shows

often have print series made from them or find their way into my collages.