I dunno, how small is the space between a hermit with no means looking for models, and someone who takes a bath and can afford to hire them to do the same things?
I find his work interesting in that "found" kind of way, I guess if you take enough photos and develop them in a garbagy enough environment they're always going to seem mysterious. Hence Lomography.
I wouldn't want to touch his camera either but I find it genius that he was able to put together a lensed camera out of garbage.
And he was crafty as a fox. The article doesn't mention that once he became famous people were lining up to pose for him, and that quote of his is priceless: “If you want to be famous, you must do something more badly than anybody in the entire world.”
EH