I have known Ralph for 40 years now and been a keen follower of his journey into photography since its inception. This is, in fact, the second catalogue essay I have written on his work. But Ralph’s images of Dubai are profoundly different to his images of Sydney. In these shimmering reflections of Dubai arising from the depths of its own ingenuity, Ralph seems to have reinvented himself as an alchemist – transforming all that he sees into pure gold