Ray Carofano

    Ray Carofano is an American Photographer. His career as a photographer spans over fifty years. In 1969 he started his business Ray Carofano Photography Inc. Where he focused mostly on commercial work. In 1991 he began to focus more on his fine art work. In 1998 he began his series Faces of Pedro. This series was of formal studio portraits of neighborhood “characters”. He has had several other series as well. Carofano was influenced and inspired by his childhood experiences with the homeless and a tribe of gypsies.

    The Image I chose to look at is called “Phil #2” from his Faces of Pedro series. I chose this image because I love how he captured this man’s face. This is a black-and-white portrait of an older gentleman. We do not know much about the man but from the title of the piece, we can assume his name was Phil. We can also tell from the stern look on his face that he is serious and probably a little sorrowful. I love the way the lighting is not too harsh on his face because if it was too harsh, we would have lost a lot of the great details in his face. We can tell this is an older gentleman because of the white coloring of his hair and the wrinkles on his face. I like how sharp the detail is on this man’s face as well.