Open Air
Part of art’s appeal is that it is closed off. It operates with a strange idea of the public—signaling that it doesn’t need the people it claims to serve. Let it be walled off. There is room to be creative on the outside, in the open air, where things are real and unmanaged.
Let It Be a Mystery
Trying to think about my photography kit. I have so much gear that I can’t begin to use it all, and I’ve had to reexamine what, why, and how I photograph. Free time, funding, location, and material costs are all things that have changed and that I’ve had to navigate.
The Fading Neon
The small mom-and-pop truck stops are gone, replaced by large chains.
Falling Short
I want to convey that quiet alienation — the stillness and loss of not fitting what the world demands. The point isn’t self-help but to help somebody else. I can’t fix the world or be everything everyone needs, but if I can help one person right now, that’s something.
Autonomous Objects
I set out to take pictures of what it was like, but my pictures look nothing like what it was like to be there. Instead, all I have are these images that exist as their own thing—and in that sense, they’re kind of nice, too. I took a break from photography for too long. I thought I was done, but then I realized I was just getting started.
Travel Log
In a rare moment of clarity, I’m planning to shoot on a 35mm camera and print at 8x10 on silver gelatin. If I need to go larger, I’ll outsource to a lab.
Without Friction
Someday I’ll age—it isn’t guaranteed, but it is likely. I hope to approach it with a realistic, adaptable mindset. Many people live with their minds in one era and their bodies in another. I intend to stay where my body is—present in its changes and current surroundings. I am not young, and I have no need to act like it. I can grow older and remain in tune if I choose to do so.
Depth Over Distance
When we chase pictures of beauty and grandeur, documentary photography teaches us that the everyday is right here, hidden all around us, and that we don’t need to burn half a tank of gas to find it.
The Threshold
Art is only the threshold. It brings you to the door, teaches the eye how to focus, and steps aside so you can walk into the rooms where life happens.
The Universe Observing Itself
We are the universe standing in our shoes.
Beyond Awful
Whenever I see a perfect picture, I’ll think, surely this isn’t real.
Bumbling
I embody something infuriating — an average person doing something. The combination of being run-of-the-mill and doing something creative is a frontier.
Going to Town
A black-and-white picture of small-town Texas is sort of what western swing music looks like — if that makes sense.
Traveling Kindly
Go without want.
Poetry
If music is older than language, then that’s probably a large part of it.
In the Moment
It transitions from play to art as we age, and in learning, it continues.
Lightweight
The less we make photography about something, the more it accommodates.
Taking or Making
In photographing landscapes, places, and found environments, perhaps the difference between making and taking lives in the focal length, where a 35mm takes, and a 50mm makes.
Enjoying the Day
Interesting places exist wherever we look long enough. Odessa is a real place, nothing touristy about it, so thoroughly palpable that it’s utterly clueless about itself in a good way, and that’s why I stay.
Keep Going
If you think it’s bad now, it used to be worse. That’s why I’m not too worried. You are a part of the change you would like to see.