This is a small sample of the Tucson Portrait Project. It is a collection of 4 photo mosaics that adorn the walls of the 4th avenue underpass. The project features roughly 7000 faces. The Arizona Daily Wildcat reports that the pictures were taken from a variety of locations and events from around the city.
I first saw the project driving through the underpass, though I'd heard about it long before it's inception. The 4"x4" tiles whizzed by as I made my way downtown, and I felt like I'd pretty much gotten what had been promised. There are lots of tiny pictures on a wall. The pictures are of people from Tucson. The project is in Tucson. Makes sense.
My perception of the project began to change as I stood on the raised median of the fourth avenue underpass, snapping pictures for this blog entry a scant 4 hours before the deadline. Mournful singing floated out from deep in the underpass on the cool night's wind. A shabby homeless guy with a beat-up guitar was singing to no one, to everyone. I finished taking photos and started walking back to my car with his voice in my ear. If I had driven through, the lonesome man would just have been a blurred shape in my peripheral along with the tiny photos.
It wasn't until I slowed my roll, applied my sneakers to the pavement, and sought out the richness of Tucson that it revealed itself to me.
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