Untitled (Playground) c. 1965

Louis Draper made this gelatin silver print, Untitled (Playground), and it’s got me thinking about what isn’t there. The shiny asphalt surface, the hopscotch grid like a memory fading, a pool of water reflecting a distant light… Draper's playground is one of absence. No kids, no shouts, just the geometry of a game and the moody atmosphere of a nocturnal scene. I’m imagining Draper late at night, drawn to this spot with his camera, seduced by the melancholy of the scene. He crops the image so tightly that the grid becomes a minimal abstract form. The high contrast reminds me of Aaron Siskind’s photographs, those close-up, almost violent, shots of peeling paint on walls. Draper too is finding beauty in the mundane and overlooked. And, like all artists, he shows us how to see the world anew.