Slate Magazine Interview, Questions And Answers For Sex Workers On White Series

I am expecting a phone call today at 9am from an a editor at Slate.com. They initially were going to do a story on my large format sex worker on white portraits for their "Behold: photo blog, but now I am not so sure that will happen.  The people at Slate.com have been very nice to me and if they decide not to show that work I will understand, the subject matter is a bit controversial (or so I was told by one photographer in New Orleans "Your work is very good, but controversial, VERY controversial!).  So there will no hard feelings if Slate.com changes their mind, I thought thou I would post the questions and answers I gave to them a month or so back, posting these on the blog might be there only chance of getting online.

Here is the Q&A Slate.com did with me:

1. You've been photographing sex workers in Asia for some time. What initially made you interested in documenting these workers?


In around 1994 I watched a documentary dealing with the sex tourist industry in Thailand. In the doc they showed the bar world from the Westerners point of view, it made me want to learn what the Thai sex worker felt, what their lives were about. My first trip to Thailand was in 1996, it has been a learning process ever since.

2. You've shot environmental portraits of sex workers in the past. Why shoot against a backdrop for this series?

In 1999 I shot black and white photographs of freelance workers on the streets of Bangkok, in 2003 I made environmental color portraits in the short time sex rooms that the workers used. The white background large format was part of an evolution, a simplification and in a way, a magnification. The large format negs are so beautiful to work with, you just see everything when use a 8x10 camera. I felt that a simple no distractions white background, a large maximum info neg and flat frontal see everything type lighting would work together in a powerful way. I felt the technique was a bit like putting a spotlight on something, it focuses your point of view. there is no where for the viewer to hide, they must confront the subject.

3. You wrote on your blog about your shortime bargirl series, "The dilemma I faced is how do you show someone being exploited without exploiting them?" Do you still struggle with this dilemma in your current work? If so, how do you confront it?

Yes, its something I think of often. Photography is a visual medium, you need to be physically standing in that world making the pictures, if your story is about the exploitation of others you need to show that exploitation in a first hand sort of way. So the question that always came up in my mind was how can you photograph someone being exploited and yet not exploit them in the process. The conclusion I came to after talking to others, and thinking about this for some time was that I needed to understand why I was making the pictures, what my goals were, what was the reason behind it all, what was I trying to express. In your inner heart you know why your doing something, you know if its right or wrong, you know your true motivations, if your doing something for the right reasons, for a greater good, then that's the path you want to be on.

So what I do now is trust my heart, trust my inner feeling and motivations. You go with your feelings and you always treat your subject politely, with kindness and respect . That's about all you can do, that's as good as it gets,  that's what you need to strive for as a human being and an artist. 

4. You wrote on the PhotoNOLA site: "The sex workers of Thailand can make ten to twenty times in one week what an average Thai worker can make in one month. This makes the lure of Pattaya very strong for a young woman or man in rural Thailand." Meanwhile, you quoted a worker saying "“When I go boomsing (sex) with farang (Westerner) I smile outside and cry inside.” In talking to these workers, how do they speak about their work?

Generally there is a veil that's applied, they tend to try to hide their true feelings. When you get to know the person more and talk on a more intimate level you understand that in almost all the workers there is sadness a pain in their lives because of what they do.  One rather strange thing that I noticed that happens with the girls from the bars is as they work longer and longer they cover themselves with armor of a sort. The older girls will get more and more tattoos, they will add more and more pieces of gold, multiple necklaces, gold rings, earrings etc. I call this behaviour "their armor", it is almost like they are covering the loss of their old self with the protection of excessive displays of wealth. Another thing that's very common is that usually the longer the worker stays in the bar the more jaded and entrusting of men they become. The other common thing that happens is that  the worker who is in the scene longer tends to end up alcohol or drug dependent.

I have asked many women who work the bars what they feel when they go to bed with a customer. Most often the answers are related to helping their family or children back home (up country). When I ask them what they feel during sex with the customer more than one girl has told me that when she is with am man and he is on top of her in bed all she is thinking is "hurry up" "finish quickly".  Basically a situation where the worker wants to get as much money as they can as quickly as they can. The part that's a bit bizarre is that many times the customer thinks he is the great lover, turning the girl on, making her orgasm and all of that when in reality the exact opposite is happening.

Long the girl  from the quote you mentioned was like that, she would put up a brave front for the customer but inside she was feeling something totally different. One time I visited her small apartment and helped translate some letters she got from a English boyfriend (customer), in the letters he made all kinds of promises of love and marriage but then abandoned her. 

Last I heard she had left the bar world and working a regular job, I hope she has found happiness. There are 2 photographs of her in the show, one from 2007 when she was a gogo dancer, and one in 2009 when she worked at a different bar as a gogo dancer and sex show performer, she did a lesbian show.

5. In describing your Cambodian Brothel series on your site, you described the sadness of taking those photos. How did you feel when taking the Thailand photos? How do you overcome feelings of sadness to pursue this type of photography? 

The brothels in Cambodia were something else, something I will never forget, it was the most difficult place I have ever made pictures. The photos for this project even thou they deal with a important difficult subject matter were easier to make. Many times the portrait sessions included laughing and joking , the pics were most often made in a relaxed and friendly atmosphere of mutual trust.

You do eventually get burned out with in the bar world and dealing with it all. When you have had to many girls crying on your shoulder, when you see the drunks day after day, when you see how the worker changes with each passing year, it changes you as well. I am finding it harder and harder to return to the bars to make pictures. I keep wanting to leave the scene but just when you say  to yourself "I've had enough, let me out of here!" you meet an incredible person, a person who has worked the bar for years and yet is kind, considerate and has a compelling message. When you meet a person like that you just have to tell their story, you just have to make their photograph, you forget your depression, your sadness and you dive back in. 


6. Were the sex workers hesitant to have their photos taken? Did you have to ask permission of their employers?

Yes sometimes but after I spoke to them about the reasons behind the project they usually agreed to be photographed. Many of the subjects have allowed me to photograph them multiple times, so after the first session a trust was built and  we would often have 2nd, 3rd sessions. Some people like Long, Matt, Bla, Betty, Ti and Jiji I have photographed multiple times, from 3 - 10 over several years.

I try not to deal with the employers, I try to stay away from them as much as I can. The people making the money do not want their cash flow interfered with in any way, doing photos sympathetic to the worker could potentially cut into their profits. Its much better to steer well clear of that crowd and deal with the workers only.   

7. What were some of the challenges involved in creating these photographs?

There were challenges on multiple levels, working by mostly by myself and physically getting all the gear to Thai was difficult. Learning about the bar world and how things worked, learning some Thai so I could do the shoot the sessions while speaking a foreign language was also a challenge.

Creating the photographs made it all worthwhile, to see that final print for the first time sitting in the fix is the ultimate high, it's the best feeling in the world.

8. I read on your site that you were able to re-photograph some of the workers over a period of several years. Tell me why you wanted to do that. Was it hard tracking down your subjects again?

I have had the privilege of speaking with the photographer Jock Sturges several times and one of the things he spoke to me of was the importance of knowing your subject and shooting them over a longer period of time. After I made the initial photographs in 2007 I tried to follow his advice and shoot the same people again (I shot this project in 2007, 2009 and 2012). The problem with the bar world is that things are constantly changing, people move from bar to bar, go from one area of Thailand to another, some get sick, some go to jail  and others get married to foreigners and leave the country. Whenever I have found it possible I have  tried to contact the people I have photographed before and continue to make new pictures with them.


9. Why choose Pattaya to re-visit?

Pattaya is the hub of nightlife in Thailand, its filled to the brim with gogo bars, beer bars, freelancer workers, massage parlors and shortime bars It was the best place in Thailand find subjects that would tell the story I wanted to tell.


10. You wrote on PhotoNOLA that the people in the photographs "work in a variety of venues such as gogo dance bars, outdoor beer bars, as street freelancers, and as short-time bar workers." Why did you want to get a variety of different workers?

Different venues often have different types of workers, they all tell different stories. In the gogos both male and female you usually find the youngest and most attractive people, the beer bars have a mix of younger older, shortime bar workers are more hardcore usually more damaged by the life and the freelancers are often the most desperate they are usually quite a bit older some with serious health issues.


11. The photographs represent work over a five year period. How long would you spend in Thailand for each of your three trips?

My first three trips to Thailand were long trips, in 1996 I visited for 3 months, in 1999 I stayed for 10 and in 2003 I was in Thailand for 1 year. When I did the sex worker on white background portraits in 2007, 2009 and 2012 all the trips were shorter, between 5 and 7 weeks. The actual photo sessions would happen over maybe a 2 or 3 week period. Everyday I would do 1-2 sessions, each lasting less than 2 hours, I would shoot around 20 sheets of 8x10 film each time.


12. You wrote that "I feel that photography can be a powerful voice for change; it can help the forgotten people in our society. My dual hope in creating these photographs was to document the sex workers of Thailand as well as to raise awareness in the viewer." Have you noticed any change in the sex industry in Thailand over the years? Do you feel there is hope for these workers?

If anything the sex industry in places like Pattaya Thailand has grown since I started photographing the scene back in 1996, there is just to much money to be made for it to be shutdown, new bars are continually being built, more and more sex tourists come over to buy bodies,  the industry is booming.

As long as their is poverty in places like Thailand, Cambodia and the Philippines their will be workers for the sex tourist bars of South East Asia. The only hope for the bar worker as I see it lies in education, education can lead to other opportunities maybe a good job with decent pay, that might  keep the worker from coming to the bars in the first place. No Thai girl or boy dreams of becoming a  prostitute, no one dreams of selling their body for a living, most work the job purely out of economic necessity, give them other ways to make decent money and maybe things will change.