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Tuesday, July 14, 2026

El Baile de las Sábanas Blancas


 

These days I keep repeating what a friend tells me over and over, “Alex, you and I won the cosmic lottery in having been born and worked in the past century."




It what to me is the age of pornography in this 21st century I had a curious and most pleasant situation in July/August 1993. In those days we (writers, photographers, journalists, designers, ecdysiasts, etc) would meet for lunch at noon on Thursdays at the Railway Club. There was this lovely peroxide blonde who would sit alone on an ancillary table. We all wondered who she was. One day I rustled up enough nerve and I went up to her and said, “My name is Alex, I am a photographer and I would like to photograph you nude.” Her answer was succinct, “Sure, when do you want to do it? What is your phone number?”

When she arrived at my Robson corner with Granville studio (the Farmer Building) she took all her clothes off and I was shocked to note that she had had a breast removed.

Somehow in all my photographs I never showed any breast or the little bits that get you into trouble in this century.

One of the photographs became one of my favourite ever photographs. She was on a white bed sheet on m psychiatric couch. I just photographed her lovely legs and just a bit more.

When I was a little boy my mother would say to me, “Alex, es hora del baile de las sábanas blancas.” That translates to, “Alex it is time for the dance of the white sheets.” And to bed I went.

The other photos here to me represent one of  best moments of genuine inspiration.