California 2014

Richard Ross made this image, "California," sometime during his career, using photography. The image shows a long corridor and a line of people. I am curious, what does it feel like to wait in line? What I like about it, I think, is the evenness of the light, and also the way the line of people stretches into the distance. Each person is positioned at a cell door, looking in. It kind of reminds me of those old paintings of people queuing in an institution, or even a hospital waiting room - a space where people wait but without much hope, for things to get better. I wonder what the photographer was thinking about when they made this, and what it might have been like for the people in the queue. How long have they been waiting? What were they thinking about? Artists are always talking to each other across time, borrowing and reinterpreting ideas. I wonder what the story of these people is, and what they were waiting to see.