Between the City and the Sea

Miami Beach was already beginning to stir that morning.

I was there for a video shoot with my friend Melina Almodovar, but I continued photographing what caught my attention around me.

The shoreline stretched toward the distant city while the Atlantic filled the other side of the frame.

Above the beach, a flock of birds crossed the early morning sky. Another bird remained near the water's edge.

I don't remember whether seeing the flock was what caused me to raise the camera.

Knowing the way I photograph, it may have been.

But after all these years, I cannot say that with certainty.

I don't want to turn what seems likely into something I claim to remember.

What the photograph preserved is enough.

The birds in flight.

The quiet figures along the beach.

The distant buildings.

The pink clouds catching the early light.

The open Atlantic beside them.

For one fraction of a second, all of those separate things occupied the same frame.

Between the city and the sea.

Between the City and the Sea is structured around several distinct elements sharing a broad coastal landscape.

The shoreline enters through the foreground and recedes toward the distant Miami skyline, creating a visual connection between the immediate beach and the city beyond. The Atlantic occupies the right side of the composition while a large expanse of open morning sky provides space above both.

A flock of birds crossing near the horizon introduces movement into the otherwise expansive scene. A single bird standing near the water's edge provides a quieter counterpoint to the airborne group.

Small human figures along the beach and the distant buildings establish scale without becoming dominant subjects.

Although the flock occupies an important position within the composition, Colón does not clearly remember whether the birds initiated the exposure or entered a scene he was already observing. The Studio preserves that uncertainty rather than assigning an intention that cannot be reliably reconstructed.

There are photographs for which I can remember exactly what caused me to press the shutter.

This is not one of them.

When I look at the flock crossing the sky, I think that may have been what caught my attention.

It would make sense.

It sounds like me.

But thinking something probably happened is not the same as remembering that it happened.

What I have instead is the photograph.

It tells me what was there.

Birds moving through the sky.

One bird remaining beside the water.

People scattered along the beach.

The city in the distance.

The Atlantic beside all of them.

I don't need to recover a memory that is no longer clear in order for the photograph to matter.

Sometimes the photograph is the surviving evidence.

And sometimes what it preserved is enough.

Made on Miami Beach, Florida, on July 25, 2016, Between the City and the Sea belongs to the same morning of photography as Undisturbed (FCS-PH-0148) and The Morning I Had Forgotten (FCS-PH-0152).

Colón was on Miami Beach that morning for a video production with his friend and musician Melina Almodovar. Photography was not the primary purpose of the outing, yet several independent photographs emerged as he observed the activity, light, shoreline, wildlife, and people around him.

The three accessioned works preserve substantially different aspects of the same morning.

Undisturbed isolates a woman meditating on the beach.

The Morning I Had Forgotten concentrates on the extraordinary relationship between sunrise light, clouds, and the Atlantic.

Between the City and the Sea expands outward, incorporating shoreline, distant skyline, people, birds, ocean, and open sky within a single coastal view.

The photographer's exact reason for making this particular exposure is no longer remembered with certainty. Rather than reconstructing an intention retrospectively, the Studio record distinguishes the visible evidence contained in the photograph from what can no longer be reliably recalled.