I tend to overanalyze everything, and that habit has made me bored at various points in my photography journey. As you know, I started out making images that leaned more toward the fashion or “pretty” side of things. But that trope is an easy formula for boredom and it quickly left me hungry for something else.
What I really wanted was more substance and not exactly to be “deep” or “intellectual,” but simply to have more fun while shooting.
This whole process has been a kind of backward discovery of how my creativity actually works. It’s not something I’ve consciously built over time. As a general rule, I find the act of merely capturing reality kind of dull. For me, it’s more about generating moods.
Looking back over my body of work, I notice a lot of photos that live in the “what the fuck is this?” realm rather than the “oh look, a pretty portrait” one. That’s because I’m drawn to elements like tension, mood, and texture. I think more about setting a feeling than getting a perfect pose. A big part of that process comes from the models themselves, who are often equally involved in the creative direction behind the images you see.
I’m sharing all this because I finally understand my work a bit better now and it’s not about chasing a perfect pose or a profound concept. Honestly, many things I create simply because they look cool, set a mood, or provoke a reaction.
To synthesize—and to borrow from Childish Gambino—
All I do is make the stuff I would’ve liked.
Reference things I wanna watch, reference girls I wanna bite.
Now I’m firefly like a burning kite.
Finally, I’m leaving you with this latest series, born from one of those creative collaborations I mentioned. Victoria is one of the most versatile and imaginative models I’ve ever worked with. I wish there were more like her out there.
