the sultan of swat

larry sultan, a great photographer and all around cool dude, passed away on sunday. here's a nice article from the nytimes about sultan as well as some images below that i've always loved.

a photograph of sultan's mother, Jean, from the series, "pictures from home." the series focused on sultan's parents and was later turned into a book in which sultan combined recent portraits, old family snapshots and text, prompting the reader to examine the validity and value of visual documentation in relation to collective as well as individual family memory.

a photograph from sultan's series, "the valley", in which he visited and photographed suburban homes that had been rented and turned into sets for adult films. rarely shooting the sex acts themselves, sultan focused on the off-camera activities of the actors as well as their surroundings.

you can check out more of larry sultan's work here.