Some say that Luang Prabang is the most peaceful city in Asia. I found my own symbol for this peace in the upright hands of two Buddha images stored in a darkened corner of an ancient Luang Prabang temple. Three different factors work in tandem here to bring mood, atmosphere and meaning to this photograph. The contrast in color is astonishing – a blackened upright hand enters the frame from the left and stops just short of a brilliantly colored hand, its gold leaf and red paint eroded but still flamboyantly visible. The abstracting interplay of light and shadow is all embracive, creating a flow of black negative space between the hands that fairly crackles with energy. And finally, that energy is intensified because of a very slight blur due to camera shake. I had to make this image at one quarter of a second, hand held, in a very dark room. The very slight blur makes the hands seem to move almost imperceptibly, but they are moving. All of these factors give this image its sublime mood, which goes on to express a powerful emotional tone: peacefulness