Artist Statement + Bio

As a kid, I was always creating something. My parents put me in everything — gymnastics, soccer, violin, dance — and I loved it all. On Saturdays, I wrote stories that my sister would illustrate, and I spent afternoons staging puppet shows in my bedroom or performing dances in my grandmother’s dresses while she filmed me with her big shoulder-mounted camcorder.

My days were a loop of imagination and play. I made up dances in the basement and mailed them off to Disney Channel, invented elaborate games for my Barbies and baby dolls, and painted beach scenes or martini glasses on canvases from Hobby Lobby that my family proudly displayed. I practiced violin before I could even read words, learning to read music first. Creativity wasn’t something I did — it was simply the air I lived in.

I first fell in love with photography around age thirteen, right when Instagram launched and Tumblr was at its peak. For Christmas in seventh grade, I got a Canon Rebel T3, and my sister and I immediately began taking dance photos of each other — along with endless pictures of our pets, outfits, and hairstyles. We even had a joint Instagram account that was very Tumblr-core and, in hindsight, a little embarrassing.

But my first real experience with photography came earlier, when my mom placed a disposable camera into my lunchbox for a fifth-grade field trip. I still remember that day in Durham — visiting the Museum of Life and Science and Bennett Place — and how it felt to take those first photos of my classmates. Later that year, I brought another disposable to the Biltmore and photographed my friends there too.

Most of my early images were dance photos and experimental portraits I shared online — awkward, nostalgic, and honest beginnings that became the roots of how I see and create now.

By the time I got to high school, I was still taking digital photos here and there, but I didn’t discover film photography until I was seventeen. At the time, I was really interested in concert photography and wanted to submit my work somewhere — but the submission guidelines required film. So, I decided to learn. I found a Konica camera on eBay, loaded a roll, and completely botched it. My first successful roll came a little later, on a school trip to Costa Rica — the moment everything finally clicked, both technically and creatively.

Around that same time, I started using my dad’s old Olympus XA and took some of my favorite early images while visiting London at seventeen. Those photos — of streets, strangers, and quiet corners — made me realize how deeply travel inspired my eye. Moving through new places taught me to notice light, rhythm, and emotion in a way that changed how I saw the world, and how I wanted to photograph it.

Not long after, I began photographing more personal moments — my aunt’s wedding, family gatherings, and everyday scenes around me. I started to fall in love with photographing people — the small, unguarded gestures, the way light shaped a face or a feeling.

My influences span both photography and performance. I’m deeply inspired by Justine Kurland, Robert Mapplethorpe, Pina Bausch, Marina Abramović, Messy Heads Magazine and Patti Smith.

Today, I live and work in New York City, photographing primarily dancers and artists — capturing movement, portraits, and creative collaborations. Alongside my client work, I continue to shoot film, building a growing body of personal imagery that I hope will one day evolve into a book and gallery exhibition.