Untitled 1993

This photograph by Thomas Roma captures a moment, an atmosphere, a feeling, all rendered in shades of grey. The beauty is in the way Roma coaxes tones from light and shadow, a process of layering and revelation much like painting. Look at the woman at the centre, her eyes closed, almost in a trance. The details in her lacy collar are incredible, picked out through the subtle gradations of light, like brushstrokes. Her stillness is framed by the energy of the figures around her: the woman to the right, beaming, caught mid-sentence, and the quiet intensity of the woman on the left. This photograph reminds me a little of the work of Garry Winogrand – the way he captured life on the streets of New York. But there’s a tenderness here, a sense of intimacy, that feels very particular to Roma, it's a reminder that art is always a conversation, an echo, and a reinterpretation.