Street Photography and Dignity

Walking near a hotel in a downtown hotel in Louisville Kentucky I came across this man sleeping on a sunny sheltered from the wind sidewalk near the hotel I was staying in.  I am more documentary, than street in style, but this is classic street photography.  Capturing urban life in its rawest form. 

Often I see images like this, and they show details of the person, that make the person identifiable.  Louisville has a lot more people living on the streets than it did when I went to graduate school there 25 years ago.  There is a way of documenting this life, while preserving the dignity of the person.  

From the back, with the person sleeping facedown, the person is not identifiable, but yet it is clear what is happening.  He was sound asleep, I could have easily taken a photo from the other side, showing his face and beard pressed into the sidewalk. Closer up in detail, his shoes are on the sidewalk, he is wearing one sock, one of the grippy socks they put on patients in the hospital.  Traffic goes by, the person sleeps in the warm sunlight, nearly unnoticed by the city around him. 

I chose montone for this image.  I keep a program button on my camera set to black and white, making it fast and easy to switch back and forth. The color show his feet and shoes better, maybe it is better.  Those details may make it better, and still preserve the dignity of the person.  

I sometimes wonder what choices I made that moved my life in a different direction than the man sleeping on the sidewalk.