My friend Robert Norton introduced me to the singer-songwriter Seal. I’d been a great admirer of his for many years and was very happy to make his acquaintance. Seal emerged from England’s house music scene in the early ’90s to become the most popular British soul vocalist of the decade, and is still going strong on both sides of the Atlantic today. Seal’s lineage can be traced to Nigerian, Brazilian, and Afro-Caribbean roots; and one of his middle names is Olusegun, which means “God is victorious.”

We had lunch at the Beverly Hills Hotel and immediately got along like brothers. I’d been involved in photography since before I could walk, yet I learned more about cameras and photographic technology from Seal in one afternoon than I think I had in my whole life. As well as being a talented musician, he is a serious photo nut, a great photographer, and a great appreciator of photography. I was very proud and touched to learn that one of my father’s most famous photographs of the Nuba in Kordofan—his homage to man’s humanity to man—was hanging in a very prominent place in the home Seal shared with his wife, supermodel Heidi Klum.

Several months later, I set up the camera outside Seal’s home, and we chuckled like silly schoolboys, as the British tend to do.

“What is God?” I asked.

“My perception of God is that it is this infinite energy that is visible all around us, if we care to look. It’s right in front of us,” Seal replied.

“So basically, people use the word God to describe something that is giving us life?”

“I don’t know if it’s necessarily giving us life, but I think it’s constantly confirming life. God is pretty much everywhere; and you can see that through looking at nature, looking at human beings, looking at your reflection.”

“Do you pray to God?”

“I used to pray a lot more, kneeling down at night or first thing in the morning; that’s the way we were raised. Do I pray now? That’s debatable because I do believe there’s such a thing as silent prayer. I think that meditation can be perceived as a form of prayer. I spend time alone clearing my head, focusing on my thoughts, and trying to reconnect with myself.”

“Do you see God in your music?”

“Not always. I’ve had one or two flashes of it throughout my life; you can experience that when you’re writing certain songs. The best songs I’ve written are the ones that happen really quickly and that write themselves. I remember when I wrote ‘Crazy,’ it was written literally in about ten minutes. That’s one of the songs, along with ‘Kiss from a Rose,’  that to this day, resonates with people more than any other. I wasn’t conscious of writing them; they almost wrote themselves. I think that’s probably the closest I’ve been, in terms of my music, to a state that is infinite and beyond words.

“I think there’s God in everything we see,” Seal continued. “So whenever I need to connect with God, I always look at this thing I hold around my neck.” He pulled out a gold locket and opened it up to reveal a series of coins with pictures of his family on them. “Sometimes it’s a photograph or a photo album that I carry with me. But if you look right here, that’s four examples of God.”

He showed me a picture of Heidi and his children. “On the reverse side, that’s another one. There’s another one. There’s yet another one. There are two on the back—that’s my wife and me. I think that if I’m constantly reminded by those access points, I need look no further. Over the years, I have chosen to see God in people.”