Welcome to my favorite photos! Hope you enjoy!
Top Row:
Rico Nasty; Don’t Mute DC 95 Live Festival - Rico is probably one of the nicest musical artists I’ve ever met. This photo was taken moments before she hit the stage. I asked if she wanted a few photos beforehand and she shyly declined, but after affirming to her that it was totally fine, she quickly changed her mind with a smile, as pictured here. She ended up posting this photo to her own page too!
Betty Boop - Did you know Betty Boop was originally African American and was inspired by the black woman jazz singer named Esther Jones? In the spirit of the romance of Valentines Day and the culture of Black History Month, Emily (model), Joelle (outfit curator), and I wanted to pay homage and show love to Esther, who deserved mainstream success and love from all Betty Boop fans of the world. She was well-known in Harlem, NY for her “boop-boops," “doop-doops,” and similar jazz sounds. Her original cartoon character after a few appearances on television was whitewashed, and the character generated millions of dollars from TV networks and merchandise without a single penny going to “Baby Esther.” Here’s to Baby Esther and the flowers she deserved.
Middle Row:
“shoot here” - This was taken at IDK’s 2nd annual Project KKIDD Family Reunion and basketball tournament. IDK has strong ties to Prince George’s County, where I’m also from, so it was heartwarming to see him putting this event on for the community. Although this photo is in black and white, the court itself had a traffic-sign yellow color to it that I felt would distract from the bold, black text on the court.
Lucky Daye; Afropunk - This photo is unequivocally my favorite photo I have ever taken since picking up a camera. Lucky had a moment where he just looked into the crowd with this look of awe that I had never seen before; almost as if he broke from his normal singer/artist character just for a moment to look into the crowd. What I also can’t get over is the amount of detail I was able to capture in his hair and his chains, even while being so far away.
Gunna; Rolling Loud Miami - I may or may not have slipped through a gate behind the stage to take this photo. I plead the fifth. After seeing how grand of a stage set up Gunna had during his set, I wanted to showcase that by using my 14mm fisheye lens. From the bright, bold, white headlights to the wispy purple and blue tones on the screens, I hope that you can feel the same energy that I felt during his set.
Bottom Row:
Zhariah; Have You Her’d - Zhariah and I have been in contact since the Don’t Mute DC 95 Live Music Festival where I shot Rico Nasty. I saw her name on the Have You Her’d concert lineup, which was composed of all women artists, along with two DJs that I knew before, and knew I wanted to come through just to shoot for fun. I also wanted to test out a few new techniques I had recently learned, and this blur effect happened to be one of them. Months after this, Zhariah invited me to film her entire experience performing at Afropunk in Brooklyn NY.
Club Love Chaos - This one has an interesting story…I was down in Miami and had met up with a DJ I previously met in LA, and she said she would be able to get us into Diddy’s Club Love party happening in Swan Miami, a restaurant in Miami’s Design District. Shortly before taking this picture, King Combs and his brother saw my flash and confronted me to ask who I was. After sharing my connection, it was all good…but that was an interesting moment for sure.