THIS IS MY EYE

A fictional exploration of how a young girl of color might move through and capture her world with a camera.

“My dad says it’s not what you look at—it’s what you see.” So begins a young girl’s documenting of her life and surroundings in New York City. The blurred lights and background when she spins, the mirrors in puddles, the stories on walls, the shapes and patterns of everything, the “little things that grow in little spaces,” and even the smile of an upside-down selfie. The city’s sweeping landscapes juxtaposed with its small, pulsating minutiae pick up an easy momentum as the poetic text moves rhythmically from page to page. The energy and pace of the city is channeled to the impact of each photograph as they are strung together by the observational text. An author’s note clarifies that the photographs are Vaswani’s (Same Sun Here, with Silas House, 2013, etc.) work, taken to mimic the perspective of a fictional 9-year-old girl. While readers may be prompted to wonder how a photo series taken by an actual child photographer might have differed, Vaswani’s debut picture book is an elegant and playful look at perspective, photography, and a familiar (to many) cityscape.

A captivating journey.