Frank Zappa | Portrait 1989

Portrait of Frank Zappa at home, on Woodrow Wilson Drive, Los Angles, California, 1989. I had moved back to Europe and Italy in Fall of 1984. Zappa was one of the most intelligent and interesting artists I'd met while living in LA. For a period, I rented a house across the street from his. "Armando, would you like to come and hear some tapes" he would call at 2AM. He lived at night, with his coffee and Winston cigarettes. He was my special beacon in Los Angeles, and I have always been grateful to the stars that the man liked me. I kept coming back to LA over those years, and sometimes I would call Frank. "Come over!" was always his answer. This photo was taken in the spring of 1988 or 89. He was writing on a new keyboard. "It does everything, so I don't have to explain to the musicians what to do." Always busy, ahead of the times. I wanted to take a photo outside, but when we did go outside, the sun was quickly going down. I used a flash, a little trick to light up the subject and see the sunset. It ended up as the last photo I took of Frank Zappa: looking at it now, I see the sunset of his life. He passed away with prostate cancer 4 years later. Age 52.