Personal Work

I was in my mid-twenties when I began making aesthetically impoverished images with a Canon AE-1, a film camera given to my partner and I. Given to us by my sister-in-law. My progress as a photographer moved slowly forward as film was expensive and I was busy adulting. I was working as a classroom assistant at Early Headstart then, in Portland, OR. After a day of masking at work, I’d crash. I’d crash hard. By the time I started making sense of photography and had an idea of what I wanted to accomplish as a photographer, I was readying myself for fatherhood. Marilyn Silverstone, an English photojournalist turned Buddhist nun, once said: “You cannot take part in anything and photograph it.” Not fully, she went on to say. I didn’t know who Silverstone was at the time, but I knew the sentiment. Before my spouse went into labor I’d made the decision to put my camera down. To be fully present with her and my kiddo at birth and beyond. That’s not to say that I stopped taking photos entirely; rather, I made a decision to curb my interest in photography in order to be present. Presence placed me in the classroom with my kiddo for several years, as his homeschool teacher. And photography became something that I’d fit in between parenting, lesson planning, and teaching, meaning: it rarely happened. But now that my kiddo has returned to a brick-and-motor school and is quickly approaching adulthood, both my spouse and my kiddo have encouraged me to get out with my camera more. It’s required no arm-twisting. For me, photography is akin to a spiritual practice. It’s my meditation. And it’s resulted in a growing body of work that I’m happy to share with you in the following galleries. Karissa. Isaac. Thanks for the nudge!