I make interesting photographs. My theory is that what I am looking for is always around me. So I carry a camera, shoot black and white film and over time, a theme emerges. During the last year, I have been seeking out museum curators to show these pictures to. I’ve bought clothes for the occasion, researched bed and breakfasts in the major cities and plotted my itinerary. Most of the time I’m familiar with the museum, sometimes not. First I send a letter on photographic stationary with the usual supportive material. Then come other letters, calls and finally the meeting. The other day, as I was preparing my portfolio for such a meeting, I wondered how from the curator’s view I looked to them. What was it like to meet me? But I cannot generalize; no two curators are alike. Besides, I am not inside their heads and have little basis to know what’s going on in there. The only person whose feeling I am absolutely certain of is me. So I decided to put myself in the curator’s place and ask myself what would it be like to meet me. What would I think upon seeing me in the place where I know everything and where everything is under my control? Before seeing the work, the whole reason for this entrance into my world, how would I judge him-his bearing, his clothes, his facility with the conventions and awkwardness of meeting a stranger? If I tried to rate him by my own standard, how would I find him wanting? His language, his willingness, starting at the instant of our meeting to engage and respond to the place and to me by both following and leading the conversation. Would he be able to travel the maze of pathways or would he find himself blocked and silenced? How would I evaluate his vitality not only through his speech, but his gestures- the way he would walk to greet me? Would he appreciate the drama of two artist meeting for an hour and then departing? How would he take a joke-one meant as much to measure him as to let myself laugh? And how would he show me his wares, maybe with the impatience of one who has been through this many time, or with the pride of authorship? And how would I see his pictures? Probably in comparison to my own work, maybe in comparison to others, both living and dead, and just maybe, just maybe, depending on the work, as the pictures themselves. And if against all odds these pictures turned out to be as good as the work of artists I admire and respect, then what? A mixture of enthusiasm and some careful conversation because this is the first meeting. When the hour was up, he would put his pictures back in the box, shake my hand and leave. And what would be left? Probably two partially finished bottles of water, a slight bit of disarray and a moment before the next hour began.