Artist Statement

I don’t really remember when I first became interested in photography but I was very young when I received my first digital camera. It was a little red camera. One of the first photographs I remember taking was a close up of some red plump berries in the palmed hands of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden display at the Creation Museum. My interest in photography grew tremendously during my sophomore year of high school. I taught myself how to take better quality pictures and practicing methods that I’m not as good at until I finally got to college where I got to take real photography classes.

Photography is used to express so many things in our everyday lives and that is exactly the reason I love photography. I didn’t know I wanted to be an artist when I was younger. I probably wanted to be everything else from a lawyer to a surgeon. I never thought that being a photographer was an option. People always told me that “it didn’t count” and that it “wasn’t a career.” So, naturally I chose to ignore them. I believe God blessed me with a wonderful gift and I don’t want to waste it.

A camera captures out memories on film; ones that we wish to remember or even forget. Theodore Levitt said, “Kodak sells film, but they don’t advertise film; they advertise memories.” Moments of love, joy, pain and even sadness. My photographs are like a diary of the lovely moments in my life. My photographs are memories that I chose to hold on to. Photographers see things differently than the rest of the world. They can see beauty where others don’t. The beauty in the old, seemingly broken things: like an old building or dead roses.

As a photographer, I want to let God show through my pictures. I want to capture God’s creation, humanity and nature. When people look at my pictures, I hope that God can speak to them through what I have captured, and leave them with a sense of wonder at his creativity and artistry…and to think that it all began with a little red camera.