Richard Murai’s photos at Weston Gallery are not just black and white.

One of the conflicts of our age may be that technology can uproot us from the natural world. Think about how Tinder and Facebook can influence our relationships; or how packaged items at the supermarket so little resemble the natural life cycle of food.

With his camera, Richard Murai tries to capture evidence of “the hand of God” in the tangible vessels of people, objects and architecture across the world.

Weston Gallery is showing his black-and-white work in Signs of Life: Worlds Apart. One shadowy photo depicts a monk sitting in a dark chamber shrouded by incense smoke; another, a long shot of a person paddling a boat down the Mekong River in the hazy sunset. These are sumptuous and artistic photos, contemplative and candid but with the “participation” of the subjects, mostly of a religious nature but Murai’s wider subject is there within the frame.

“Rene Magritte said that ‘Everything that is visible, hides something that is invisible,’” Murai writes in an email.

Once he has found his subject, he says he “enters each location with an open mind,” and uses Magritte’s quote as a mantra to guide the aim of his camera.

“I’m acutely aware,” he says, “of unique and powerful cultural and religious trappings within each location and by the very act of framing objects such as a hanging prayer scarf, scathing light across ancient frescoes, or a stream of pilgrim candles, one can assign meaning and elevate the commonplace.”

But his quest for manifestations of spirituality also brings into focus the effects politics has on the material world.

He says that his travels and his camera have showed him how corruption and religious extremism have foiled people’s escape from poverty and war. He’s seen how newly acquired freedom from the military junta in Myanmar so quickly improved people’s lives.

But he also knows that a lot of misconceptions abound, so the mission of the former university professor is also enlightenment of another kind.

“Becoming sensitive to unfamiliar cultures can quell much anxiety and may encourage tolerance and compassion.”

What is a camera but a technology? Like the mobile phone, or the MRI, or airplanes. They can bring us closer together and help us appreciate life more or longer. Murai’s photos show more than what is depicted. The show is subtitled “Worlds Apart” but it’s in irony.

“Differences in language, dress, customs and location are a given,” he says. “However everyone expects nothing other than to be respected and honored, and to be prosperous and safe.”

SIGNS OF LIFE: WORLDS APART artist reception and talk is 4-6pm Saturday at Weston Gallery, Sixth Avenue, Carmel. 624-4453, www.richardmurai.com