It was a hot mid-afternoon in July three years ago. I emerged from the stiff AC of The Eatery and took the N to Prince St. Broadway was a bright projection of people, shadows and dancing sunlight. A mild but persistent whiff of rotting trash curled around the edges of the pavement. I ducked into a Mango store, relieved to have regained the antiseptic calm of AC interiors.

I looked up to see a large black man reach out to me with a card in his hand. “Umm…I’m a photographer,” he said. “And I’d like to photograph you.”

Three years later, I’m chilling with Lou in my apartment. He’s brought me a box so I can easily store all the prints from the various shoots we’ve done. And I’m helping edit the bio for his website. 

I shake my head, “Lou, you’re a big black dude who’s a UPS delivery man. But what you really are is an artist who creates beautiful images. Talk about confounding stereotypes. We’ve got to get the word out about you.” But Lou just shrugged, because politics, racial stereotypes and commercial success don’t mean much to him. The image does.

 And so, I’m telling Lou Roole’s story in his own words, through his images. 

How did you get into photography?

Lou: I was stationed in Italy in the army and bought a camera to document my stay. It was around 1988.

Jia Jia: Did you know how to do photography then?

Lou: I knew nothing. I took some classes at Miami Dade Community College. My founding principles for how I shoot are from three people: Orlando, Chuck, and Weslely Clark.

Jia Jia: And what are these principles?

Lou: I’d be showing Wesley stuff that I thought was great and he’d go, “Yo you’ve got too much stuff going on. Clean it up.” Chuck’s biggest thing was, “If you’ve done it before, why are you doing it again?” Orlando, before I even took his class, he took a look at some of my work and asked me, “Why do you shoot the way that you do? Why do you do what you do?”

Jia Jia: Why do you?

Lou: I said, “Cuz I can’t paint!” (laughs).

What do you shoot?

Lou: Mostly I shoot women. I do landscape stuff too. The other day I shot some benches. I’d always wanted to shoot them but can’t during the day because there are too many people sitting on it. So I went there at three in the morning to shoot it.

Jia Jia: Are there certain qualities that inspire you in the women that you shoot?

Lou: I don’t think so.

I think every woman has a different thing. The fundamental is that “je ne sais quo” quality. Because there are a lot of beautiful women and I don’t really care. Some women I shoot I don’t think are pretty but I love photographing them.

Jia Jia: I noticed that you sometimes shoot women with awesome tattoos.

Lou: Tattoos are interesting because it speaks to a person’s personality. Today, anybody can get tattoos. To me, the woman who has a big and significant piece is still outside of the normal.

I see tattoos as people making a statement of permanence and that interests me.

A woman, even a guy, has a tattoo on the side of her neck, you definitely know she’s marketing herself to not be in the mainstream. So why would she do that? What is it about her personality that makes her say, “Hey look, I don’t want to be accepted as the mainstream. I’m standing on my own two feet. I’m not like everybody else. I’m me. The path that I’ve chosen is gonna be difficult.” I mean she can’t get a mainstream job with a tattoo on her neck, no matter her talent level. So what would make you do something like that? That’s an interesting person to me.

How do you work with your models?

Lou: It’s very synergistic. My job is to recognize what they give. Everybody gives you something different so if you lock in, you’ll get what they give.

Jia Jia: I remember you saying that different female models have different views of their bodies.

Lou: This is true. I remember one time I was shooting this girl nude in the kitchen and all she could think of was how women in the kitchen should look and act. I just thought it was an amazing space! But she was focused on the political ramifications of the pictures. This other time I wanted to shoot a girl in a hotel and she was like, “well if you shoot me in a hotel, I’m going to end up looking like a whore.” And I was like, “Whoa! Where did that come from? I’m just thinking about you in this space. That’s all I care about.” I don’t really care about stuff like that.

I’m just trying to create a space and a place. People are always going to get their connotations from whatever they see. There’s nothing I can do about that.

You approach people on the street to ask them to shoot with you. Is that difficult?

Lou: I’m not trying to have conversations so it’s not difficult in that sense. The accumulation of rejections becomes difficult. But I’ve been reading a book that helps me process the rejection differently and how much of it is on me. Because it’s not about me.

Jia Jia: How do people react?

Lou: Generally women don’t take my card. They walk fast and try to get away from me, like he’s trying to mug me, rape me, whatever. Sometimes they take it to be polite I think. At the end of the day, the people who take my card can at a minimum do research. Whereas if they don’t take my card, they can’t do nothing about it.

Jia Jia: Yeah, I remember feeling dubious when you just stood in front of me in Mango. But it was the middle of the day with tons of people around so I thought I should take your card and look you up to see if you’re legit.

How do you know when an image is good?

Lou: You feel it in your soul.

When I’m shooting, I know when I’m on a roll. Like I was on a shoot last Sunday where I just knew that everything was good. And I told her but she didn’t believe me until she saw the pictures. But I already knew before I even developed the film.

Jia Jia: Do other people agree with you on what’s good?

Lou: Everybody sees what they want to see. The other day, I showed a girl’s picture to someone and he thought it was ok. Then I showed it to somebody else and he was like, “Yo she’s really dope!” So, two completely different opinions about the same set of pictures. So at the end of the day go with what you like. Sometimes you rely on others’ opinions because they have more expertise than you do but at the end of the day, you just gotta believe what you believe about what you do because everyone’s got their own opinion and they’re coming from their own experiences.

Do you have a philosophy about photography—why do it, what it means etc.?

Lou: I just shoot. I like a person, I like a place. I put them in that place and we try to get something out of it. Usually, when I have a fixed idea, it never seems to work out. A guy gave me a book once called Zen and the Art of Archery. It kind of holds my philosophy in that sense, like don’t really try to hit the target but you hit the target anyway. At least that’s what I got from the book! (laughs). You go through the process and the process gives you. Then you get what you get.

Jia Jia: I guess you don’t spend too much time navel-gazing! But you do think about the future, right? New projects etc.?

Lou: I want to do underwater photography, not just nature but take the models under water. I think about going to these communities that have women who dive for a living, in places like Tahiti.

Jia Jia: That’s very different from the urban stuff you shoot now.

Lou: Well, I’d like to go out into the desert and the jungles too. Change my environment. I shoot what’s in my environment. If I lived in the jungle you’d probably call me a jungle photographer, same if I lived in a desert. I don’t try to put people in a box. Some photographers have a specific style and this is who they are. I don’t think you can define me like that. I just see things a certain way and shoot.

Click here to see more photos by Lou.
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