Benjamin Swett (Trees of New York City) chronicles events in his childhood and adult life that have ushered him to photograph, write, and ponder the significance of moments left uncaptured. Through the eight essays that compose The Picture Not Taken, Swett incorporates anecdotes about his family history, the natural world, and racial politics, as well as dozens of black-and-white photographs. Skillfully placed within the text, the images enhance and explain Swett's celebration and critique of life and art.
Photography serves as the collection's central subject. "A photograph, when it is taken, represents a moment of intense and sudden love and insight for something visible in the world--for the world itself, or for life, or for one's own self; a moment of connection that momentarily dissolves the barriers between the photographer and the things around him, outside him." Swett thoughtfully connects his visual art with equally stunning prose, writing of growing up, raising children, and losing loved ones, and of photography. "Visits to Coney Island, a trip to the Central Park Zoo, kite-flying in Prospect Park were doubly significant occasions first through our father's recording of them, and then through the prints he made." Swett's professional knowledge of cameras and photographs intertwines with vulnerable accounts of immense love and heartbreaking grief.
As his artfully curated essays describe recollections from New York to New Zealand, Swett begins by focusing on his father's love of photography and ends by discussing his own love for the same craft. Wholly rooted in the personal, the deeply thought-provoking The Picture Not Taken is a creative combination of memoir and art. --Clara Newton, freelance reviewer