A Threshold the Light Remembers
I stepped onto the sandstone causeway while the sky was still veiled in the last notes of night. Each pilgrimage footfall ahead of me sounded less like movement than memory. A monk paused beneath the vaulted arch, lifting a single stick of joss. The ember glimmered—the briefest star—and smoke curled upward, vanishing into the dark rafters.
Below that rising thread stood Ta Reach, the eight-armed Vishnu, cloaked in sequined saffron and half-draped shadow. I waited, camera still at my chest, until the air within the gopura settled into the tempo of his granite breath. Light gathered slowly, folding along his shoulders, brushing the curve of a smile too ancient to belong solely to mankind—yet tender enough to remind us the divine has worn our faces before.
Incense finds the dark—
stone exhales what night has kept,
dawn leans into breath.
The shutter opened like an eyelid unclenching a dream. Time slipped: one long exposure that felt shorter than a heartbeat, longer than an age. In that unmeasured interval, the statue seemed to lean forward—not physically, but with presence—affirming every pilgrim’s quiet hope that the sacred is still awake. Later, in the dim red hush of the darkroom, I coaxed that presence back into fibre and tone, letting chiaroscuro recall what the corridor had whispered: creation and dissolution are held gently in the same unseen palm.
Outside, the lilies along the moat caught their first light. Within, a softer brightness remained—hovering in the space my breath had briefly occupied. I left a single jasmine petal at the statue’s base and stepped away, carrying the weight of a gaze that belonged to both past and forever.
Also in Library
The Asura Within
At the gates of Angkor Thom, gods and demons share a single serpent.
Across this bridge of struggle the pilgrim learns that the asura is not evil but unfinished — the restless force within each of us still grasping for light.
To cross the naga is to balance passion with compassion, struggle with stillness, shadow with dawn.
Garuda and the Serpent · Flight and Surrender
Between Garuda’s wings and the Nāga’s coils, Angkor breathes its oldest truth: flight and surrender are one motion. In the carvings where sky and water entwine, the pilgrim learns that freedom depends upon gravity, and that stillness itself is a kind of flight.
The Measure of Silence: A Pilgrim’s Reflection on Kingship at Angkor
Through the ruins of Angkor, a curatorial pilgrim traces the vanished geometry of divine rule. In the silence of the stones, kingship reveals itself as both devotion and decay—an empire of alignment turned elegy, where even ruin retains the measure of sacred order.
$250
Angkor Wat Temple, Angkor, Cambodia — 2020
Limited Edition Archival Pigment Print
Edition
Strictly limited to 25 prints + 2 Artist’s Proofs
Medium
Hand-toned black-and-white archival pigment print on Hahnemühle Bamboo — a museum-grade fine art paper chosen for its quiet tactility and reverent depth, echoing the spirit of the temples.
Signature & Numbering
Each print is individually signed and numbered by the artist on the border (recto)
Certificate of Authenticity
Accompanies every print
Image Size
8 x 8 inches (20.3 x 20.3 cm)
Morning gathers in the western gate of Angkor Wat, where a single thread of incense rises toward a darkened ceiling, and the eight-armed Vishnu—Ta Reach—emerges from shadow into a slant of newborn light. Sequined saffron cloth, garlands, and weathered sandstone combine not into sculpture, but into presence.
Pilgrims pass barefoot across the worn stone floor. A monk lights a stick of joss and bows beneath the vaulted hush. Here, the gods do not sleep—they listen. The artist lingers in silence, waiting not for a perfect frame, but for communion. When the shutter opens, it is in reverence.
Captured on medium-format black-and-white film, the image was shaped in the studio through classical chiaroscuro techniques and hours of patient hand-toning. Each gesture on the print speaks with its own voice—depths of shadow, glints of light, a carved smile that contains both creation and dissolution.
Printed as a hand-toned archival pigment work on Hahnemühle Bamboo paper, the result is a tactile hymn—each piece signed, numbered, and offered in a strictly limited edition of 25 with 2 Artist’s Proofs.
Let this silent guardian keep watch within your calmest room.
Previously titled ‘Ta Reach Vishnu, Study I, Angkor Wat Temple, Cambodia. 2020,’ this photograph has been renamed to better reflect its place in the series and its spiritual tone. The edition, provenance, and authenticity remain unchanged.
