The Shock

I met her in this room. 

Many times before I had seen her, and her shock of white hair - a prominent streak framing her face. I was drawn to it and the ease with which she admired the many works in Dia:Beacon, pointing, smiling, commenting to her friends as she pointed at one corner or another. Finally, it was in this room - which must have been a Dan Flavin piece with its shower of yellow fluorescent light - that I asked to photograph her. She accepted after a short pause.

Her name is Yael, she is from Tel Aviv, Israel and her favorite colors are "black, and green, and red". When I asked why there were three she laughed and mentioned that in Israel you didn't have to have just one favorite - so she had many. A shy smile on a face of Israel, two intense eyes, and three favorites in a nameless yellow room where she stopped being a stranger, to me.