She Saw Sea Shells

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Thought I would share this learning lesson from my past.  I call it

“She Saw Sea Shells”


When you’re an artist, you learn early on that once your work is out in the world, it no longer belongs to just you. It becomes a mirror—distorted, clear, or even absurd—of whoever’s standing in front of it.

Years ago, in a small gallery in Palo Alto, I learned this truth the hard way. Or perhaps the most entertaining way.

At the time, I was a young photographer experimenting with still life. I wasn’t shooting celebrities or dramatic landscapes yet—just carefully curated studio setups. For this particular piece, I brought in sand from Monterey, shaped it into delicate waves using a fan and a comb, and placed a gleaming conch shell at the center. Two tiny crabs walked toward it—perfectly staged, perfectly lit. To me, it was an elegant dance of nature—movement frozen in time.

Opening night arrived, and with it, two elderly women who stopped before the piece in deep conversation. Curious, I drifted behind them… and overheard something I could never have predicted.

To them, the scene was not about nature, not about beauty, not about stillness. No. It was about… male crabs. Competing. For what they described as an open, glowing, pink,… well, I’ll leave it to your imagination. Let’s just say they saw something erotic. Symbolic. Even primal that was beaconing to the male crabs.

I stood there, frozen. Had I… created that?

I had not. At least not intentionally. But that night I learned a lesson that’s stayed with me to this day: Art is not just what you create—it’s what others perceive.

People don’t just see your work. They project onto it. Their lives, beliefs, longings, traumas, humor, and everything in between. That’s what gives art its staying power—and its unpredictability.

Since then, I’ve come to embrace that unpredictability. In fact, I chase it. I want people to see something in my images—even if it’s something I never imagined. That, to me, is when art becomes timeless.


I never saw those women again. But I’m oddly grateful to them. Because their wild interpretation reminded me that when art meets the human mind, the results can be hilarious, bizarre, or strangely beautiful.

And I have learned to not be bothered but what others think of my work, or me.