Joel Meyerowitz American, b. 6/3/1938

A paved terrace above a river, in autumn light that falls through the leaves in patches. Beyond a dark parapet the water shines below a far bank with houses along its crest. The terrace is full of people, scattered across it. In the foreground a bearded man in a tan cap and red shirt has his face half in shadow. Behind him stands a woman in a pale green coat, white hat and white gloves. In the middle a man in a long grey overcoat holds his head in both hands; beside him another folds his arms. At the right, a man in a cream cardigan, a woman in a white coat dappled with leaf shadow and, at the very edge, someone raising a camera to the eye. Children play behind an iron railing at the bottom, and against the sky a silhouetted man stands full length above the line of the parapet.

Whatever brought these people here, the picture does not show it. Their gazes and gestures point in different directions, and each, taken alone, could mean almost anything. Meyerowitz declines to supply a centre; the composition spreads across the frame the way the light does, in patches.

What I find irresistible is the figure at the edge with a camera. There may be another photograph inside this one, made at the same instant, and we will never see it. Perhaps it explains this afternoon; perhaps it explains nothing. Between the two pictures lies the whole problem of documentary. We trust a photograph to tell us what happened, and this one tells us, very precisely, that something was happening, while withholding what it was. The terrace is full of evidence and there is no event. Meyerowitz has made an honest image of that condition, which is the usual condition of the world and hardly ever the one photographs pretend to show.