Smoke

The series Smoke came into being through tne friendship between Ackerman (1967) and Benjamin, a singer in an obscure band called ‘Smoke.’ Benjamin was a junkie infected by AIDS. “He was fragile, violent and raw. I visited him in Gabbagetown, his neighbourhood in Atlanta. On my first night there I found him passed out on the floor, surrounded by pictures, clothes, magazines, drugs and other baggage of his daily life. I put him in bed and stepped out to discover a place isolated and lost in time. There was one store, a big cemetary, an old cotton mill and some kids who seemed older than their age. During my time there almost nothing happened. Yet there was something in the air and maybe photography is about what you can’t hold on to. This group of pictures is called Smoke, not just to honor Benjamin, who died this year, but also because while in Gabbagetown I felt as ifI was continually watching things disappear”.