A journalist by profession and a photographer by obsession, in both my worlds I am a gleaner, listening and looking for the telling detail to capture, the moment of revelation that slips away too quickly. Behind the camera, I collect visual ephemera: how the edge of a building reaches toward a cloud, the way shadows play on a wall or sunlight glints on steel. I'm the one you'll see stopping in the middle of a crowded sidewalk to stare at the sky, crouching down for a closer glimpse at peeling paint, or craning my neck to make visual sense out of a cluttered construction site. Through my work, I hope to share my delight in the sublime textures painted by light on ordinary objects, the patterns that reveal themselves amid urban chaos. Photography for me is a way of experiencing the city in its many moods, of finding--and focusing attention on--beauty in the ordinary, the ugly, and the unexpected.

To learn more about me and see work in progress, please visit my flickr site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jhattam/