As is always the case, it’s impossible to distill any year into a selection of images. And while summarizing in this way cannot possibly reflect all the year’s nuances, I find it to be a really helpful exercise for my own photography practice. It gives me the opportunity to ask myself how I was using photography for the last twelve months.
That reflection has come to reveal some often unconscious connections between the various projects I’ve been engaged in. Looking back at my images from two years ago in 2020 for example, it was clear that I was using photography to try and make sense of the world outside of myself.
Looking back at my images from 2021, I see myself looking inward. I was able to use photography to deepen my relationships with those closest to me and as an excuse for introduction. I even photographed myself formally for the first time!
I consider myself a documentary photographer, but that term can mean so many things. As opposed to being a more detached observer, I found that in 2021, photography became a point of engagement—it helped enrich my experiences, brought me closer to the people I was photographing, and helped create new layers of meaning in my life.
As a photographer, I have so many people to be grateful for in 2021. I’m grateful for the friends, family, and strangers who graciously allowed me to capture their images. I’m grateful to the clients who hired me. You all allow me to make a living doing what I love. I’m especially grateful to everyone who pre-ordered a copy of my cookbook project Heart-Shaped Tomatoes. I feel incredibly supported and lucky to be doing what I’m doing.
Take your time going through the twenty-one images and videos that I chose to represent this year. You can click on the images to enlarge them.
I was setting up my camera when Houston-based rapper WxxdyB hopped out of his car and asked “Do you shoot videos?!” I told him I mainly shoot photos and asked if I could take his portrait.
My grandmother Elda Cristini the day after her 101st birthday in Belmont, Massachusetts.
Thomas Mann, from the series Being Tom.
Contemporary beading artist and Big Chief of the Young Seminole Hunters Demond Melancon at his studio in New Orleans, Louisiana.
For me, 2021 began as I put on a suit and went to work for the Texas Senate five days a week and spent weekends driving to Houston to help a friend and chosen uncle through prostate cancer treatment.
My job with the Senate was admittedly very challenging. I was often in the room as bills that I believe violate our constitutionally mandated civil rights were being passed. I’m very comfortable documenting history as a photojournalist serving the public. But documenting history as a service to the Texas Senate was not something I was comfortable with long-term. While I worked for the non-partisan Senate Media Department, I felt that in a small way I was aiding the process of passing the legislation I was fundamentally opposed to. Naturally, there was a lot of introspection.
As a photographer, I often think about the moments I’ve missed—photos I regret not taking. As a bill I was fundamentally opposed to was passed in the Senate, its author called on me to capture a moment of triumph. Without thinking much about it, I stepped into my role as a photographer, took the picture, and left for the day. Coming back to work the next morning, I went through my images from the previous day. I was fixated on that series of images. I realized that for the first time, I regretted taking a photo.
The image was unremarkable, and there’s no need to share it here. But it was an important moment for my progression as a photographer.
Have you ever regretted taking a photo?
While I working for the Texas Senate, I would leave Austin each Friday right after work and drive to Houston where I was helping an artistic mentor and uncle figure of mine, Thomas Mann. Tom was undergoing prostate cancer treatment at MD Anderson and needed help making jewelry, but also just appreciated the company as his ability to interact with other people was basically non-existent because of Covid. I was getting tested six times per week because of my job and taking extreme precautions not to get Covid, so I felt comfortable visiting Tom.
My experience with Tom turned into something I never could have imagined. We’d cook and make jewelry together during the day, and spend hours just sitting and talking with each other at night. I had some of the most influential conversations of my life during the three months I spent with Tom—conversations that shifted how I see myself as an artist and what I’m doing as a photographer.
I ended up creating a large body of work about Tom that is broadly about his experience of sickness in isolation. Below are a few images from the project. I’m excited to share more about that project as soon as possible!
By May of 2021, I was completely burnt out. I had almost no time to myself between January and May and while that period of time was one of the most artistically and personally fulfilling moments of my life, I needed a break from everything and everyone.
Towards the end of my contract with the Texas Senate, I was offered another contract to teach a photography workshop in Yellowstone National Park. I jumped at the opportunity which gave me the perfect excuse to plan a five-week road trip from Austin to Montana and back. I spent a lot of time looking for stories and creating more photography work, and just as much time camping on mountain tops and soaking in remote hot springs.
Monument Valley in the Navajo Nation.
Waking up to photograph the Bonneville Salt Flats at sunrise, I stumbled across an interesting scene as I was heading back to the interstate. I would come to find out that I had just entered the second largest amateur rocket launching event in the country—LDRS 39, which of course stands for Large Dangerous Rocket Ships. It’s the Tripoli Rocket Association’s premier event each year and was hosted by the Utah Rocket Club this time around. I spent a couple of hours watching rockets explode into the desert air and making pictures of this passionate group of enthusiasts.
“Everybody wants to be a tooler. They wanna make saddles, they wanna make pretty stuff. They don’t wanna get their hands dirty.”
“Religion is man’s interpretation of what God has to say…I consider myself a man of God who rarely succeeds at being a man of god.”
Dallas at the Majestic Dude Ranch in Mancos, Colorado.
During the last quarter of 2021 I needed to focus less on creating new personal work and more on finalizing my cookbook project Heart-Shaped Tomatoes while balancing some exciting freelance projects. Heart-Shaped Tomatoes was co-authored by Madelyn Wigle with recipes by Elda Cristini and Maria Cristini. I can finally say that the book is finished! It has been printed and is currently on a boat from South Korea to the United States. Global supply chain issues have delayed the delivery of the book, but it’ll be here soon!
One of my favorite freelance projects of the year was creating these short videos for GoDaddy Studio, a new app that GoDaddy acquired. After paying for a subscription, users can use stock video content on their own social media. I tried to create videos that could exist beautifully on their own even before users overlay their own logos, text, etc. It had been a while since I had shot any video, but getting back into it has given me energy to reincorporate it into what I’m doing personally and professionally.
My girlfriend Kendall Narde was an amazing model for this shoot.
As I look forward, I’m excited to finally be able to deliver Heart-Shaped Tomatoes to the hundreds of people who have already pre-ordered the book. I have some more work to do to finalize my project Being Tom and look forward to sharing that work soon as well.
Self-portrait taken at my grandma’s house the day after her 101st birthday.