Am working on a gallery submission PDF for THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY. Here are some of the photos and a write up that might be included.
Update* The PDF is finished, these are the photos I included.
 |
| Ying 37, laughing under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019 |
 |
| Dao, waiting under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019 |
 |
| Bia 55, in his slum shack home with cardboard roaf and pictures of the king, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019 |
 |
| Bia's old truck, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019 |
 |
| Goh, on his sled under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019 |
 |
| Dom 58, laying under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019 |
 |
| Chompoo 62, sleeping under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019 |
 |
| Anapon 52, in his room under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019 |
 |
| Jack, on the street, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019 |
 |
Dom 58, confused under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
 |
Anapon 52, in his room under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO
LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
|
 |
Anapon 52, in his room under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO
LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey, Slum Bangkok, 2019
|
 |
Anapon 49, in his room under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO
LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey, Slum Bangkok, 2016
|
 |
Bia 55, in his home with royal family pictures, THE PEOPLE
WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Dom 58, waiting for drug customers, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE
UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Dom 58, waiting for drug customers, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE
UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Dom 58, arguing under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER
THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Dui 35, in his home, a mattress with curtain, THE PEOPLE WHO
LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Jack, sitting outside his slum shack, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE
UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Jack, sleeping in his room after meth use, THE PEOPLE WHO
LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Jack, smoking meth in his shack, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE
FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Lavah, walking drunk and barefoot under the freeway, THE
PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Ooh 40+,, in her home under the freeway with her beloved dog,
THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Ooh 40+, cooking her supper (rice) after her work day, THE
PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Owen 52, wandering under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE
UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Owen 52, on a pillar under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE
UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Oye 72, meeting friends under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO
LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
 |
Group digging through garbage bags, THE PEOPLE WHO
LIVE UNDER THE FREEWAY, Klong Toey, Slum Bangkok, 2019
|
 |
Ying 37, under the freeway, THE PEOPLE WHO LIVE UNDER THE
FREEWAY, Klong Toey Slum, Bangkok, Thailand 2019
|
“The People Who Live Under the
Freeway” is a social documentary photography project shot in Klong Toey Slum; Bangkok
Thailand. The photographs focus on the lives of a group of Thai people who live
under an active freeway in Bangkok’s notorious Klong Toey Slum.
The pictures in the series are made
with a Leica M6, Leica R6, Rolleiflex Twin Reflex 2.8 F, 5x7 Linhof film
cameras. The lens used include 16mm, 21mm, 24mm, 35mm, 50mm, 60mm, 80mm, and a
120mm for the 5x7 Linhof camera. My film choice is Tri-x exposed at 800 ASA and
given minutes. STAND development in Rodinal for 1 hour 15.
Note* In 2019 I also shot this work
with a digital camera. If you would like to see those photos simply go to the
blog and do a search.
My photography is inspired by the
great social documentary photographers, W. Eugene Smith, Lewis Hine and
Sebastiao Salgado. The reason I make photographs is a simple one. I believe
that social documentary photography can be a force for positive change in the
world. I feel that social documentary photographs can help people in need.
The themes behind my images are
straight forward. I make photographs that focus on societies forgotten and
ignored people. I try to tell my
subjects story with compassion, empathy and honesty. Then I use those
photographs to raise money-goods to help them.
It is the perfect circle of creative life. I make the photos, viewers see the
photographs in galleries and online, then money-goods are donated to help those
in need. Everything is then given directly to the people in the pictures by me.
All donations help the people in need. No middle men, no waste, no BS. Photos
are made, lives are helped, it is as simple as that
My first trip to Thailand was in
1996. Through the years I have studied Thai
culture and their language (can speak conversational Thai) as well as photographed
various projects including:
-
“Body Sellers”, a series of portraits of sex
workers who work with foreign sex tourists in Pattaya, Thailand.
-
“Klong Toey Slum” which tells the stories of
some of the people who live in Bangkok’s notorious Klong Toey Slum.
-
“Muay Thai boxer about a Muay Thai boxing gym
in Klong Toey slum, Bangkok.
-
“Families of the Dump” a long term photography
and humanitarian project detailing the lives of Burmese refugees who work and
live in the Mae Sot Thailand garbage dump.
“The People Who Live Under the
Freeway” is a project dating back to 2012, the
year I started to explore and meet people in Klong Toey slum in Bangkok.
One day I came accidently came across a man named Anapon who lived in a small
dirty room of scrap wood boards under an active freeway. Khun (Mr/Miss) Anapon
is a quiet man who smiled shyly at me and was very polite as we spoke. Later I found out he was an ex Muay Thai
boxer who had traveled internationally. He had lost his ability to box after an
injury, then lost his family and eventually ended up living under the freeway.
Back in 2012 when I first met Khun
Anapon, I also met another man named Goh. Khune Goh would wheel himself around
under the freeway on a handmade skateboard like cart which he would kneel upon and
push forward with his arms. Along with Goh and Anapon there was a women who
also lived in the area nearby, her name was Ooh. Khun Ooh has mental health
issues and a dog she loves and walks daily. At point in her life Ooh was
married to a Western man who lived in Thailand but they separated and she ended
up alone with her dog on the street. She is not sure of her age, she only tells
me she is over 40. She often looks around
in a frightened and shocked way, especially if there is a loud noise.
Over the next several years I became
more and more connected to the lives of my new friends. I would return for a
day here and a day there, photographing Anapon, Goh and Ooh. In 2014 I found
out that Khun Go had passed away. I was told by Anapon that one day he just did
not wake up in his shack room and the police took his body away and cremated
it. He had just disappeared. I think of that sometimes when I make my
photographs. Khun Goh now only exists in the pictures I took of him. They are
all that is left of him, all that is left to show he was alive. That is part of
the beauty and importance of photography, remembering lives. Photography is
about photographing the story of people’s lives so that after that person
passes, they can be remembered through the pictures.
In 2019 I decided to expand the
series, to photograph more people who lived under the freeway, to tell their
stories in a bigger way. In 2019 I photographed, Dom 58 a local small time drug
seller, Vee 40, Lavah, Oye, Jack a young man who suffers from substance abuse
issues, Bia 55, a local truck driver, Chompoo 62, Ying 37 and Dui 35 a couple
who lived together under the freeway on a mattress with cloth walls.
The more I looked, the more people I
found, the more stories that needed to be told.
“The People Who Lived Under the Freeway”, is on-going project that I
will continue with when I return to Thailand in 2020. My friends who live under
the freeway are the poorest of the poor of the slum. They are forgotten, kind,
good hearted, friendly people. Their stories need to be told, and I am hopeful
the photographs will help them.
Thank you for taking the time to read
their stories and view their photographs.
