I got back to New Orleans from New York and wanted to pursue my passion in photography doing nude portraiture, but I didn't quite know quite know yet where to start. I wanted to do it in the styles of my favourite photographers George Platt Lynes, George Dureau and Robert Mapplethorpe. The problem was that the only places I knew at that time to find models were the gay dating sites. I began to ask boys on there to pose for me. I was nervous because it really was about the art and how do you ask someone to bare their butt when you haven’t had the experience nor the confidence! The more I was rejected the more I learned how to let go and ask again.
I was immediately attracted to one guy on Grindr, Chivas, and asked if he was interested in being a model. He answered yes and when he showed up, I was more nervous than he was. Aiming to be strictly professional and not crossing boundaries is not the best way to relax or get your model to relax. He being aware of his physical beauty and what lies beneath - tall thin and pretty but knowing his vulnerabilities enough to be real is the kind of model I love to photograph. He was so patient while I figured out the mechanics and my case of nerves..
Over the 6 years and close to 10,000 photographs that we've worked together we've gotten to know each other pretty well with nights of drinking too much vodka or none at all. I have photographed him in every emotion - some in dramatic states and some authentically real.
I've photographed him on the day he moved to Florida and the day he moved back.
I've fallen in love with the muse and wanted to kill him all in the same setting.
I submitted five photographs to a juried show called Louisiana Contemporary at the Ogden Museum. Two of my works made it and both were male nudes. One of them was very subdued in blue canotype and one was of Chivas straight on in the camera. I walked up to see my work hanging on the museum's walls and there they were in the alternative lifestyle section. As I got closer, I discovered a woman with her mouth wide open. "Oh my heavens, I have found the gay penis section!"