
David Armstrong (1954–2014)
THE FIRST, most distinctive thing about David Armstrong you noticed upon meeting him was his voice. It had not so much an accent as a sort of wistful cadence. It sounded like a mother comforting a child she is preparing to suffocate with a pillow.
I met David in the summer of 1981 in Provincetown. He was staying at the home of a man named Paul Johnson, a sparkly-eyed clammer whose house had many areas of old wallpaper that David used to beautiful advantage in a number of his classic photographs. The first thing I noticed about Johnson was that he had a tattoo. (In 1981, not everyone had a tattoo,