Origin Story (2006–2007)

For a while, I told people that I started photographing at 21, believing that my artist friends in college turned me onto it; thinking that music photography was my start. But it wasn’t entirely. I was 12 years old when I made that photograph of my own shadow.

One holiday, I visited my childhood home in Nashville, and discovered 4 x 6” prints in a drawer tucked away in my closet. To my surprise, they were my true beginnings: photographs that I made in middle school, between 2006–2007, for my first photography class. This portfolio contains scenes from a camping trip, my friends, school, etc. Seeing where I come from, rendered on film, validates a hopeful sentiment that I’ve felt throughout my creative life. I have a vocation!

I remember my intial joy for photography, with no career in mind, just pure exuberance. I think these early works (which at the time, I didn’t see as “works” at all) show an intuition for the human form. My rediscovery of these pictures have allowed me to retrace the origins of my interests, and simply slow down to appreciate the craft. I feel far removed from the middle schooler that made these pictures; and my even younger self on the steps of my mother’s home, but it’s nice to know that my love for making pictures was always evident.