Every photographer or artist has a story, or a beginning to their magic.
Art; being their magic.

My art, or what I'd like to call it, being photography.
At the age of 15 my life had to say the least; been tormenting. Many things had gone horribly wrong, from being torn, battered, beaten, & abandoned, to being completely left alone in the dark with no sheltering arms, but my lonely & frail own. I was caught in a dark place, where tears were the only water to drink, & hunger was abundant & never-ending, thirst never quenched. Before my 16th birthday, I had almost died twice at my own hand, allowing my depression to make me a coward, but, the miracle is that I lived...

My depression. My darkness. My sorrow.

To begin with; I had started off writing at an early age, with poetry being published in school papers, & scholarships offered in journalism before even leaving middle school. To me, literature, writing; was my release, but I came to learn, that it wasn't something that actually made me feel better or happier. That dark sorrow still remained looming over me.

My photo interest began to show after my experience in modeling. I didn't want to be infront of the camera any longer, I wanted something more powerful, more expressive, more significant, deeper & something that actually did come to make me feel content, relieved, & free. To be behind the camera.

I started out completely hands-on, with a physical black binder portfolio to show clientel, & with a simple aim & shoot casio digital camera. To surround myself with something that put me at piece; I began photographing nature, macro, sunsets, & natural beauty of the world. Other photos that remain more personal to me were taken, untouched, unedited, & put into a specific folder until seen fit to release the huge burden of pain released & expressed into them. These which remain unsubmitted; containing images conceived from horrifying nightmares that I've clawed myself over, cried myself over, & deprived myself of sleep & life over. My nightmares would be my biggest inspiration, the pain, the horror, the fear of them fuels me & once this portfolio of dark secrets is complete; I will open & share the freedom of release to any spectator who dare to gaze upon the images. Some will question, some will argue what they do not understand, & some will relate. The strongest, deepest forms of art are always contraversial.

To me, photography is the power to freeze time. You can capture a moment, frozen forever; timeless to hold close, to gaze physically at, & be taken back to that time, by memory. Capturing these moments on something so simple as a photograph enables you the power to look back on that moment, when you're old & grey. Photography is expression, originality, creativity at it's finest. It's taking something that can be the most simple thing in the world, & turning it into a complex, beautiful masterpiece. To me, photography is capturing a side of a person that others don't normally see, whether it be an expression, emotion, or even a personality trait shining through.

"A picture is worth a thousand words, but holds only the deepest of emotions, & embraces only the dearest of memories."

When I've lost hope & life seems dark, I find that surrounding myself in beauty, & capturing it in that moment, that moment when my heart, my mind, & my spirit feel perfectly pleased with what it sees, what it feels, & what it all means & my finger presses that button; the outcome of that beauty, frozen in time on a photograph, is all that I need to lift me up again.