Where Joy Still Breathes
There was gold in the air, not from the sky, but from the memory of it—reflected, remembered, drawn through foliage and breath. I stood before her. An apsara encircled by stone leaves, lifted mid-dance. She was not still. She was listening. Listening to her own rhythm, long ago carved into trust.
I composed the image slowly. Not just with film and light, but with stillness. The shutter did not interrupt. The camera watched without demand. Later, I would shape the silence by hand—the way one tends an ember, not to claim it, but to keep it alive.
Her joy was not ephemeral. It remains.
She lifted her foot—
not to leave,
but to remain.A turning not outward,
but inward—
a dance beneath the dance,
a light beneath the stone.I bowed without bowing.
She spoke without words.
What was carved into dusk
still breathes.
Also in Library
From Mountain to Monastery
Angkor Wat survived by learning to change its posture. Built as a summit for gods and kings, it became a place of dwelling for monks and pilgrims. As belief shifted from ascent to practice, stone yielded to routine—and the mountain learned how to remain inhabited.
Why Theravada Could Outlast Stone
Theravada endured by refusing monumentality. It shifted belief from stone to practice, from kings to villages, from permanence to repetition. What it preserved was not form but rhythm—robes, bowls, chants, and lives lived close together—allowing faith to travel when capitals fell and temples emptied.
The End of Sanskrit at Angkor
The final Sanskrit inscription at Angkor does not announce an ending. It simply speaks once more, with elegance and certainty, into a world that had begun to listen differently. Its silence afterward marks not collapse, but a quiet transfer of meaning—from stone and proclamation to practice, breath, and impermanence.
$250
Ta Prohm Temple, Angkor, Cambodia — 2021
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)
There are moments when light seems to arrive not from above, but from within the stone.
At Ta Prohm Temple, as the sun dropped behind the jungle canopy, a warm breath of dusk spilled across the western gopura. A single apsara emerged from the wall—smiling, suspended mid-dance, her foot lifted inside a ring of carved foliage. The sandstone glowed gold, as if joy had kindled it from the inside.
Lucas Varro stood in stillness before her. The jungle had hushed. The wall seemed to breathe. And in that hush, he released the shutter—medium format black-and-white film drinking in the fading light. Later, in the quiet of his studio, the image was shaped using long exposure, classical chiaroscuro techniques, and a golden hand-toning process that recalled the warmth of that sacred dusk.
Printed on museum-grade Hahnemühle Bamboo paper, this archival pigment print is offered in a strictly limited edition of 25 + 2 AP.
She dances still—within the stillness you welcome her into.
