In my humble opinion, photography has a unique role in the world of art. Photography is seeing beauty in unusual things. Yes, there is always the typical nature scene or landscape, sunset, or the converse shoe (which I myself am a perpetrator of three times.) There will always be these things that we look at and label as “beautiful” or “breathtaking”, and they, someday and somewhere, will be photographed.

Now, I am in no way taking away value from these things. I myself love a beautiful photo of landscape or sky or the details of a flower or plant. They’re all wonderful things to photograph and have on film. But photography can, in some circumstances, have that unique role I mentioned before: seeing beauty in places people do not notice when they merely walk down a street. How many times have you stopped to look at a crack in the road because you thought it had great potential? Or a man just sitting at a café? Yet somehow, when we see pictures with perfect lighting and composition to go with the subject, or in black and white to match the mood, we find them to be beautiful or are touched by a certain emotion.

Photography is here to capture that uncommon and unexpected beauty.

I spent some time collecting photos I thought reflected this theme very nicely. Here are my selections, and I hope you enjoy them.