To communicate requires that those who view the work also understand. Fortunately, people respond to visual stimulus on more than one level. Abstraction, for instance, has always played a big role in artistic expression, and it is becoming more accepted in photographs. There’s nothing new about abstraction in painting, but for some reason people respect painting more than photography. This might be because photographs are so widely used by the media in this culture that they are regarded as mere ephemera… you look at a photograph once and then turn the page.