You could say he just shows what is. But he photographs between services, avoiding the parishioners and instead rooting around behind the scenes to emphasize the tacky stagecraft. Religious services can become entertainment (what's wrong with that?) or propaganda, but stories, parables, and performances are also a way we help one another understand the world, a way we build empathy. Johnson's behind-the-scenes photos make the churches look crass and cheap and shallow. They may be that, but his photos don't prove it. He's stacked the deck.
Read Greg Cook's blog at gregcookland.com/journal.
Related:
Dicked over, The old neighborhood, Our Sgt. Schultz society, More 
- Dicked over
This article originally appeared in the December 22, 1995 issue of the Boston Phoenix .
- The old neighborhood
Some call Charles “Teenie” Harris’s five decades of photos of Pittsburgh one of the grandest chronicles of African-American life ever assembled.
- Our Sgt. Schultz society
“I know noz-ZINK!” That was the catchphrase of John Banner’s character, the Nazi prison guard Sergeant Schultz.
- Eatin’ good in Boston’s ’hoods
Part of the backbone of any urban neighborhood is its small, independent restaurants.
- Tinseltown East
Looking at the photographs now, it’s hard to believe it ever existed.
- Off with their heads
The signs are getting bleak for the man in the White House and the party in power.
- The Gospel According to John
Why are all documentary filmmakers liberals?
- Never mind the Citgo
For all the complaints that Boston is losing its character, there’s still a lot to this old, weird city. It’s just a matter of taking a closer look.
- The overtime game
The problems haunting the Boston Police Department’s homicide unit — low arrest rates, cases rejected by juries, and exonerations of wrongfully convicted men — did not occur in a vacuum.
- The Gray Lady in shadow
Fearful that his presidency could be swept into the same historical dustbin as Richard Nixon’s, an unrepentant President George W. Bush seems intent on prosecuting the sources who leaked to the New York Times the details of his administration’s warrantless domestic spying.
- Nixon being Nixon
Nixon’s Nixon is to Richard Nixon what Dante’s Inferno was to Satan, though less sympathetic.
- Less
Topics:
Museum And Gallery
, Boston, Photography, Claire Beckett, More
, Boston, Photography, Claire Beckett, Clint Baclawski, George Eastman House Museum, gallery kayafas, gallery kayafas, Carroll and Sons, Carroll and Sons, Nicholas Nixon, Less
