Terrence Sanders Dead Lost or Displaced

"Take the compassionate eye of photographer Walker Evans, add the contemporary tragedy of Hurricane Katrina and a dash of poetry, and you have Terrence Sanders. Sanders's subjects confront the camera willingly and without coercion, with a variety of attitudes-some are vulnerable, others manage a shy or sheepish smile, a couple of them look high on something; all are united by their education in the School of Hard Knocks. "There but for the grace of God go I," might be the first thought to occur to viewers, followed by the question: What happened to these people that made them slip through the cracks? Was it moral weakness or just plain bad luck? Every day we pass people like this, on our way to work or in the supermarket parking lot, waiting by the bus stop, and often they barely register on our consciousness-and that is surely the express purpose behind Sanders' work: to make us look these people in the eye. These artworks preserve a momentary impression of a specific person on a certain day that for some reason the artist found worthy of documentation. Their presence is not immediate and palpable, but rather somewhat abstracted, shaped by the black and white film and the addition of diaristic prose that is yet subjective, from the artist's point of view. These artworks are politically motivated-they get under your skin, and once there, make themselves impossible to ignore. "You do your part and I'll do mine," the artist has written. Point well taken, Mr. Sanders. - JoAnne S. Northrup, Director of Contemporary Art Initiatives at the Nevada Museum of Art and the former Chief Curator at the Katie and Drew Gibson San Jose