Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic 1993

Melanie Eve Barocas made this photograph, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. I wonder what it was like to be Barocas, camera in hand, choosing to stop and frame this young person. There's something so immediate and vulnerable about the gaze here. It feels like a collaboration, a captured moment between two people. I'm thinking about how the texture of the concrete and the peeling paint in the background contrasts with the smooth skin and soft fabric of the headscarf. The world here is rendered in a range of greys - I think it gives the portrait this timelessness. It reminds me of some of Roy DeCarava's photographs. It's like Barocas is asking us to really see this person, to acknowledge their presence and resilience in this particular place and time.