Photojournalist Tony Salazar has a poet's intuition for images that echo beyond themselves and constellate a narrative.
Guns, tattoos, pit bulls, and cars appear alongside a tender aubade, a couple holding hands, a baby bathing in a kitchen sink; landscapes and skylines in Phoenix and Los Angeles show palm trees and messy garages; long white socks and acrylic nails of younger generations meet the smiles and traditions of elders. In a society that would rather disappear or ignore its own grittier dimensions, Salazar's work is both a refusal to be silenced and a love letter to the communities that sing, dance, live, and love, in their own beautiful and dangerous ways.
Alongside Salazar's powerful visual narrative, a series of poems by José Olivarez appear throughout the book. Each poem "speaks" in its own way-to, of, with, and beyond the subjects of Salazar's photos-with humor, honesty, and compassion. These artists together in Por Siempre are a force: expanding and lifting each other's best parts, as those in sincere and caring communities often do.
