Photographer Abram Landes is excited to open an archive of never-before-shown images to Phoebe, including excerpts from his “Fire Play” series and a few selections from “These City Lights” series.

Says Landes of his “Fire Play” series: “The other-worldly act of spinning fire is mystical and attention grabbing in-and-of itself, and I wanted the images to reflect the beautiful motion these dancers exhibit. Visually, making them black-and-white tipped them over the edge for me.”

The award-winning “These City Lights” images, with multiple exposures melted together in camera, were taken with the famously cheap Holga toy camera.

Other significant work by Landes includes “Never Forget: A Reaction to Current Situations in Rwanda” (2005) and “Lifescapes of Taiwan” (2009), which use photography to illuminate the needs of children and their societies to an American audience. Combining art, photojournalism, and a visit to a children’s home in the Rwanda project was a particularly challenging, but rewarding balancing act. “The Rwanda cyanotype prints are larger than life, so the kids’ presences would fill the gallery. Eventually, I want to see them all wall size and transport my audience to their corner of the world.”

Landes trained in traditional printmaking and photography at Penn State University. By day, he is now a commercial and event photographer in the Washington, D.C. area. At night, he is breaking into collage, reworking forgotten chemical printmaking processes, and planning new international photojournalism trips.

More of his work can be found at A.E. Landes Photography.