After leaving Minneapolis in 2012, I’d come back semiannually - depending on the year. When visiting, like everything, some things change, some stay the same. What didn’t change is my curiosity for the quaint or unpretentious comfortability. I’m very much not a “project photographer” but sometimes the pictures just come so much easier and just feel cohesive. Whether it’s rhythm, attitude, what have you - it can just work. Some of these pictures are when I used to book 24 hour or less layovers and pop over to Quang from the airport, wander around with friends, then get back on the plane to go back to California (usually). The antithesis of a flyover state. I sometimes revel in being “in on the cosmic joke” that is the midwest, and feel happy that people write it off, more to go around for the people that value it and places like it.
Been trying to figure out what my work is at large, something I’ve always struggled with. Perhaps because I’m avoidant, or sometimes I actually just would rather be photographing and pray that meaning will just magically appear someday. The pictures of mine that resonate the most for me have some sort of “authenticity” feeling, even if it’s manufactured, something about the line between reality and a dream world is fascinating. Really, the mystery of it all and asking questions. How did the picture happen? What am I looking at? What should I be looking at? What am I supposed to take away from this? Does it even matter?
Finding the balance is the game I like to play for myself, which is ultimately who I’m making pictures for. Something about looking through my pictures from Minneapolis brings this to a head for me. Perhaps it’s sentimentality, or just that I’m so between places in my actual life that I’m looking at the fantasy in my own work and trying to dream up what’s next. Enjoy the pics as much as I do! :^)
Straight up magical
Gorgeous work. I love that picture of Faith smoking on the loveseat.