The Whole Story - Photo by Elena Bouvier

Have you ever encountered someone like Sybil? Have you ever wanted to know more? I am pleased to feature this beautiful image and story by Elena Bouvier.

For a chance to be featured just tag your Instagram mobile photos with the hashtag #the_whole_story.

The Photograph

::Sybil:: © Elena Bouvier

The Whole Story by Elena Bouvier

:: Sybil ::

I heard her, before I saw her. 
Her eyes were closed 
her song moved through me 
like a bow across a cello.

Finally, she felt me watching 
and listening, smiling softly. 
She returned the smile 
and I asked what the tune was,
"My heart song".

I extended my hand,
I'm Elena, who are you?
She took my hand with both of hers,
warm and content.
I'm Sybil.

Sybil, it's a pleasure to meet you.
Do you have somewhere safe to go?
Oh baby, I've got lots of places.
Don't you worry 'bout me!
I've got the streets in my bones.

I haven't seen Sybil
since October 9. 
Hopefully, she went 
somewhere warmer.


Sybil is part of the portfolio "Anonymous America 

:: Anonymous America ::

(From the mind of a documentarian and the heart of an artist.)

Born out of haste, the desire to record a fleeting moment, I made my first street candid, Help Me, with the very shallow-focus Hipstamatic Tinto1884 lens reminiscent of plastic cameras like Diana and Holga. Enamored with the small circle of clarity directing the viewer, challenging the viewer, I began to deliberately use this lens for street scenes.

Initially, I believed this portfolio was about giving voice to those living on the edge of society, the invisible Americans. The homeless, the addicted, the veterans, the mentally and emotionally unstable; the people encountered every day asking for help, or simply seeking relief in some quiet corner.
I recognize now that these images are more than this; they are examples of how we choose to see the other, who we choose to see with clarity and respect--and who we choose not to see.

The Photographer

Elena Bouvier - I am a documentarian and storyteller, an editorialist and voyeur. Photography is the constant that ties my past to my future. It is an action; a way of being and thinking that informs, distracts, consumes and enriches my experience of this life. It is a habit, a process so familiar that it sometimes feels like muscle memory. I push the shutter to document, to collect with clarity the moments and things that will be transformed by time, memory and sentimentality. Often, my images strike me as visual metaphors of where I was emotionally when I physically made the image.

I am a free-spirit who has cobbled a career from painting murals, gardening professionally, hosting and producing a lesbian feminist radio program, book conservation, as well as editorial and free-lance photography. I have a BFA in photography from Moore College of Art and Design and an MFA in Book Arts and Printmaking from the University of the Arts. I was also a Fulbright Fellowship recipient to Germany.

Find Elena:  Website / Instagram / Backspaces / Flickr / Fine Art America