Chris Rock with Firehose, 1997 Archival Pigment Print

Archival Pigment Print Signed and Numbered by the artist Edition of 50 16x20", 20x24" or 30x36"     It was July 1997 and I was in a rut. I hadn’t shot anything I was excited about in months, and wasn’t feeling inspired. I was living in LA’s Fairfax district in a neighborhood dominated by low rent homes for the elderly; and let me tell you, if you are feeling that your career is stalled, the last thing you want to hear at 11:00 on a Tuesday morning is the sound of creaky metal walkers scraping down the sidewalk. It’s the sound of life literally grinding to a halt, and it underscored my malaise.    The life of a photographer can be a lonely one at times, and that July was especially bleak for me. If there is a photographer’s version of writers block, I had it. Then the phone rang. It was Susan White at Vanity Fair, offering me a chance to shoot Chris Rock for a ‘Spotlight’ section in the magazine. Was I interested?      The budget wasn’t great. I started thinking about all the things I c