JESSE​

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Jesse was one of the first good friends I made during my early years in Baltimore. He is an artist, craftsman, and loves getting tatted. He also helped me rehab my house with tons of advice and some major sweat installing my kitchen. Jesse was also an art teacher for a long time, so his ability to pose and then critique my work was a tremendous help.

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The photo used in this series was several years before the project began--making his image the first in the project--I just didn’t know it. He generously let me practice my documentary style portraiture photography while he taught me how to roll a cigar. We shot in his home studio above his garage. Thankfully there’s great natural light since this was before I ever used flash (on or off camera). I was shooting with both a digital camera and my old school medium format film camera, a Mamiya C3.​

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