I often make an analogy between reading poetry and reading pottery. When we read poetry we discover language that describes emotions, ideas, and feelings that are beyond words. I think of reading the qualities of pottery as something similar. We use the language of form, surface, scale, and heft—to name a few—to convey emotions, ideas, feelings that are beyond the strict confines of function.

When the photographer Mitch Epstein was asked “what does it mean to look harder” his response was

“It means to read pictures. We’re taught to read literature, but we’re not generally taught to read images. Photographs are used for so many different purposes, from journalism to advertising to family mementos. And I think remarkable photography insists upon a critical reading of a well-made picture’s layers, its conceptual tension, its historical depth. Much of the backstories of these pictures are embedded in the pictures themselves.

My goal with the American Power series was to make pictures that weren’t simply illustrative, but would resonant metaphorically, that could speak to the paradox, complexity and confusion of our cultural relationship to energy; that could convey what’s at stake. Each picture stands alone, but they come together as a series to form a narrative that suggests the bigger picture.”

—Mitch Epstein and Urban Omnibus , A Conversation with Mitch Epstein, Urban Omnibus, April 4, 2012

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