Artist Statement

These photos were all taken on the Houston Ship Channel in the course of my work as a ship pilot. Houston has been the largest port in the United States since 2004. Every day we move over fifty ships in and out of the city. The channel is open 365 days a year, 24 hours a day except in dense fog. Even so, most people are unaware of the port or, if they think of it at all, regard it as a nuisance. I began carrying a camera several years ago as a result of an unsuccessful project to find old photos of the port. I resolved to document the channel for the beginning of the 21st century and to encourage young pilots to maintain a photographic record.

This series of photos is called My Office Window. The photos in the series are connected in that all were taken from the bridge of a ship and the body of the ship is part of the photo; but they are all unique in the way they illustrate the variety of ship types, weather conditions, traffic patterns, seasons and time of day. It's what pilots see from the window of their working space.