July 25, 2024 • 62 mins
Ever wondered how to turn happy accidents into artistic masterpieces? Join us as we sit down with Jeremy Cowart, the visionary photographer known for his high-profile subjects like Taylor Swift and Barack Obama, to explore the unpredictable nature of art and the magic of childlike creativity. Jeremy shares his journey from launching the impactful Help Portrait initiative to pioneering the world of Lightographs and NFTs. Get ready to be inspired by his relentless pursuit of innovation and his unique approach to photography that ensures no two photos are ever the same.
Discover the intricate dance between passion, purpose, and creativity as we delve into the purity of creating for creation's sake. Jeremy's insights reveal the pressure of social media on today's creative processes and emphasize the beauty of embracing one's unique identity. Through personal anecdotes and quotes from iconic figures like Basquiat, Thom Yorke, Picasso and Oscar Wilde, we explore the essence of maintaining an open and playful mindset in our artistic endeavors, reminding us that true artistry thrives on the freedom to explore and express. With reflections on the importance of lifelong learning and adapting to new creative landscapes, this episode celebrates the relentless spirit of artists who continue to reinvent themselves and inspire others through their unyielding commitment to self-expression.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Ty Nathan Clark and I'm coming to you on
an early, humid, rainy Texasmorning.
It's 6.30am and I've beenarriving at my studio between
5.30 and 6.30 these days to getto work before it turns into
probably about 120 degree oven.
That is a Texas studio in thesummers and it's usually about
(00:31):
that hot around 10 am in themorning, so I try to get a few
hours in before the heat wavecomes.
But anyways, nathan a few weeksago called me and said he was
heading to Nashville for a bitand he wanted to know if I had
any artist friends in Nashvillethat he could have as a guest
co-host on the show, and so,without hesitation, I said hell
(00:52):
yes, my buddy, jeremy Cowart,let me call him now.
So you are in for a treat today, as we have our second guest
co-host on the show with Nathanfrom Nashville.
His name is Jeremy Cowart, and afew years back Jeremy was named
the internet's most influentialphotographer, and I don't know
(01:14):
if I have met somebody who isconstantly chasing ideas in
every direction, here and there,as they lead him as much as
myself.
Well, that person is JeremyCowart.
100%.
He has been constantly findinghimself in new situations,
moments, successes and failures,all while dealing with his
(01:37):
life's hardships, which israising four kids who are
absolutely incredible.
One of his child, his specialneeds.
He's had radical loss in hisfamily, all while managing his
own neurological disease.
He is a 100% true inspirationto me, but an inspiration and
overcoming and continuing tomake art against all odds.
(01:58):
And, jeremy, I'm telling youeverybody has mastered pushing
resistance to the side and justmoving forward in work and
creating art.
He has always, as an artist,sat at the edge of innovation,
invention and evolution ofphotography, combining art and
technology into his processes,and he absolutely blows me away.
(02:23):
He has photographed.
The list is long, but I'm justgoing to name a few the likes of
Taylor Swift, emma Stone,gwyneth Paltrow, former
President Barack Obama, theKardashians, chris Stapleton,
sting, miley Cyrus, dolly Parton, imogen Heap, iron and Wine
Feist, brandi Carlile,christopher Guest, eugene Levy I
(02:45):
mean, the list goes on and onand on, and I'm so excited to
have Jeremy and Nathan today onthe episode bringing some quotes
from Picasso and Basquiat,eleanor Roosevelt, oscar Wilde
and Tom York.
It's going to be absolutelyincredible.
And a little bit about Jeremy in2008,.
Before social media, he usedthe blogging network to spread
(03:08):
this beautiful, simple idea tofind people in need and take
their photos, print the photosand give them away to the people
right after they took thepictures, and called it help
portrait.
Help portrait has become aglobal movement spanning 80 plus
countries and millions ofportraits they're going to talk
about a little bit in theepisode, and the stories since
(03:31):
2008 all over the world are justmind-blowing.
They're just so inspirational,incredible.
So in 2020, jeremy invented anew medium altogether and coined
the term lightograph todescribe it.
In his words, it means theevolution of light through a
still photograph is not a videobecause there's no motion and
it's not a photograph becausethe analog light is constantly
(03:54):
changing.
And to take it a step further,he decided to make them
interactive and meant them asNFTs, and so if you take your
finger or your cursor on amobile phone and you move over
the image, you'll notice thatyou get to control the analog
light in the portraits.
It's insane.
It's crazy.
He was featured.
This is incredible.
(04:15):
Jeremy was featured at the 2022Phillips auction in London
alongside photography greatsAnsel Adams, annie Leibovitz and
Richard Avedon, and more.
It's insane.
And in May 2023, he createdAuras.
This is probably one of myfavorite things 10,000
(04:37):
completely unique NFTs, producedin 20 minutes from start to
finish, without relying ongenerative code, and it was the
first time he ever revealed hiscreative process that he'd spent
10 years privately developingin the studio.
It's one of those things youhave to see to believe.
It's absolutely incredible, andNathan and Jeremy are going to
be coming from Jeremy's brandnew studio in Nashville today in
the episode where he is usinghis process and techniques and
(04:58):
offering 60 second photo shootsto the public.
So he'll shoot 200 portraits inone minute, with every portrait
having completely uniqueresults.
It's insane and you're going tosee if you're watching this on
Spotify or YouTube.
In the video version, you'regoing to be able to see one of
his screens behind him.
It just blows me away.
Jeremy says he doesn't set goalsor plan ahead and money never
(05:21):
motivates him.
It's always about the idea.
It always has been and italways will be.
Some of the ideas failmiserably, but the lessons
learned are invaluable.
So immediately I go chase thenext one.
I've done it for 20 years andI'll do it the rest of my life.
My hope is that the public seesmy love for art and love for
people throughout all of it.
(05:42):
That's from Jeremy Cowart, adear friend, an incredible
artist, peer, and I cannot waitfor you to hear his story, his
process of innovation,overcoming so many things that
he and Nathan jump into.
So let me get off here andlet's head out to Jeremy's brand
new, insane studio in Nashville, tennessee.
(06:02):
Nathan, take it away.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Jeremy, thanks for joining us today.
Of course, you are officiallyour second guest.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
Co-host is what we've been calling it, and you are my
official first anything in thisnew studio.
I love it Ever.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
We are christening the space Very much To talk
about for the people that arewatching on YouTube and watch
the video.
So we are sitting in front of a.
How big is this LED screen?
Speaker 3 (06:29):
It is 11 feet tall by 10 feet wide.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Amazing, and so the work behind us that is being
projected here is Jeremy's, andit's tremendous.
And I'm going to try to notlook behind me because I'll just
get distracted and I won't beable to focus on our
conversation, but that's supercool.
So thank you for having me.
Of course, I'm excited to behere in Nashville with you and
excited to get into some of thequotes that you've got laid out
here.
What we like to do with ourguest co-hosts is kind of have
(06:56):
you steer the ship with regardsto quotes that are meaningful to
you around the creative process, around art and just your whole
journey with art as well.
So we'll probably just jump inwith the first one on the list
here, I'll share it and thenI'll ask you to kind of take
your first pass at how itresonates with you and why it's
meaningful to you personally.
(07:17):
So the first quote that you gotfor us is learn the rules like
a pro so you can break them likean artist.
Picasso said that Learn therules like a pro so you can
break them like an artist.
Why is that quote meaningful toyou?
Why is that something thatresonates with you personally as
a creative?
Speaker 3 (07:36):
Yeah, because I think artists and creatives tend to
be a bit arrogant in there andwas I was the arrogant artist,
so I'm speaking from experience.
But earlier in my career I waslike I don't need to read the
manuals on how the light works,I don't need to know everything
about the camera, I'll just liveon intuition and I'll just do
(07:59):
my thing.
And that did work.
Actually, my career exploded inthe beginning, landed hollywood
agent and was off to the racesand I knew nothing about lights,
nothing about camera settings,nothing about cameras, like it
was all intuition.
And so that does work to adegree if you just have a gift
for seeing, for creating.
(08:21):
But then later in my career Istarted to get really, really
nerdy about what does this lightdo, what, what are the rules,
what, what, what can the camerado?
And so the more that I learnedall the things I didn't want to
learn in the beginning, the moreit just exploded.
(08:42):
My creativity, in fact myentire process in here now is
like the most technically absurdthing in the world, like I
don't know of anybody elseshooting the way I shoot.
Yeah, and it's because Ifinally overcame that mental
hurdle and ego of you know, I'lljust live on my whatever.
And so, yeah, like I think.
(09:03):
And then once you learn allthat, like picasso says, then
you go back to the, blow it allup and make weird shit and you
know, but the more you learntrue, I actually have a
variation not a variation thatquote but I always say the more
you learn technically, the moreyou can achieve creatively.
(09:24):
And so to all young artists,like, sure, like, lean on your
natural gifts and intuition, butI'm telling you, if you force
yourself to truly learneverything that every piece of
gear can do, you'll be blownaway at what can happen.
Yeah, I love that.
So.
So another analogy um, imagineyou're a carpenter, and if a
(09:48):
carpenter has nails and a hammerand wood, he can build certain
things right.
And but then if you start toadd to that toolbox and give him
, give him eventually abulldozer and who knows what
else, like, the more tools hehad, the more, more he can build
.
And it's exact same processwith creativity, a hundred
percent.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
So I mean, when you start talking about tools, now
you're really speaking mylanguage, yeah seriously,
seriously.
Speaker 3 (10:16):
So you're a perfect example.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
When you share that, I'm reminded of a story from
your, from your book about kindof the winging it version I
forget what the title, but thestory of when you were shooting
the uh for prison break, whichwas kind of like one of your
first big gigs right.
So would that be an example ofsort of figuring out on the fly?
Speaker 3 (10:36):
That's right.
It's gotta be one of the only,not the only, but it's not often
that a photographer gets hiredon a big job like that, learns
how to do his craft from his ownassistant, literally.
Because I got hired on that joband it was like a sound stage
of equipment like lights, andbecause we had the light eight
(10:58):
or to ten sets, yeah, with fiveto six lights per set, right, I
don't even know how to use thelight.
So I had to bs my way with myassistants because, like, what
do you want to do?
And I was like I was a kid andI was 28 years old yeah I was
like, yeah, just, you know moody, but I don't even know how to.
So but then watching my own crewset up my lights on my shoe and
(11:22):
I was like, oh, that's how youset up a light and that's how
you, you know 100, I learned byliterally just doing and
watching my own crews, you know,set stuff up yeah, so what
doors got open for youcreatively once you did develop
a level of competency or evenmastery, you know, with all the
(11:42):
many tools that you can use inyour particular craft.
What doors opened up?
Speaker 2 (11:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
Yeah, just people coming to me because I was doing
things really different.
And I was doing things reallydifferent because, like I was
just saying, I was learning thetools and learning how to master
it all.
So my other advantage was whenphotography switched from analog
to digital which I'm now reallydating myself because that's
(12:08):
been about 20 years I wasalready a graphic designer and
so I had this massive advantagebecause all these old school
film photographers were likewhat Computers, photoshop, like
what is this?
And so I was just like just 90miles an hour ahead, with way
ahead of the game, so early inmy career.
(12:28):
That's another reason I gothired.
So much is that I knew how todo things that no one else did,
right, um, which I guess weshould have started with that
background.
Is that, um, you know?
Uh, to rewind a bit, growing upI really just wanted to be a
painter.
That was my obsession all theway through childhood, high
(12:50):
school, college.
Then my parents were afraid ofme making a living as a painter.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Right.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
And so they were like , have you heard of this thing?
You know computers and graphicsand Photoshop?
I was like, oh hell, no, I waslike scared to death of
technology, of like going youknow all these computers thought
I was an idiot.
And so they, they sent me nowon this gosh, 30 year detour of
(13:17):
away from painting and fine artinto all things digital, which
is uh, which has been amazing,that they does the most
important thing they could haveever done.
But it's weird because I stillfeel like I'm just a painter,
stuck in this, this world ofcommercial and digital you know
it's crazy.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
Yeah, how do you think that impacts your, your
work or your approach to thework that you do?
Speaker 3 (13:41):
I actually shoot now very much like a painter, and
what I mean by that is I mean,the work you do is extremely,
first of all, beautiful.
I just saw his work for thefirst time today.
It's incredible.
Appreciate it.
But any abstract, we'll go tothe abstract painter, like even
(14:03):
Ty.
When I watch Ty's videos, he'soverseeing a process meant to
even surprise him.
He doesn't know where everysingle drip of paint is going to
land.
He's not controlling everylittle, but he is controlling
the overall vision and mostphotographers are.
(14:25):
It's the same thing.
They're expressing something.
They know where they went theirlife, they know where they went
their thing.
Steven Pressfield said mostartists are expressing
themselves.
The rest are discoveringthemselves.
That was probably the mostprofound like weight off my
shoulders, because all theseyears, even recently, I always
(14:49):
felt like, well, I'm not anartist if I'm not, like pouring
my soul onto the canvas andexpressing some traumatic event
or whatever, like I've justnever been that artist.
Like when I create, it'sdiscovering.
It's like I don't know what'sabout to happen.
I don't think ty, I don't thinkyourself really know, knows
(15:10):
what's about to happen, rightuntil you get in and you just,
you just do it, and so all thatto say a long way of saying that
this, what you're seeing rightnow in my studio, is a contrived
happy accident when it comes tophotography, like it's all
designed to surprise me.
I've got lights changing, I'vegot this wall changing backdrops
(15:31):
, I've got crap in front of thelens that's reflecting light,
prisms and all kinds of stuff,and when I shoot, the cool thing
about the process is no photocan be reproduced because I
don't know which background part, I don't know which light part,
I don't know which prismreflected which way, because I'm
even moving the prisms of theshoot and then you have somebody
(15:52):
standing in front of the cameraand whatever pose or expression
or thing they did.
So it's all this combination towhere that can't be done again,
and that's why I consider myform of photography is a form of
art and expression, reallydiscovery.
It really is like abstractpainting, because I used to be
in studios and I hated itbecause it was the same light,
(16:16):
the same angle, the samebackdrop, and so it's taken me
years to figure out how to shootlike a paint, which is just
like this wall behind us, whereit's just stuff dripping and
splattering and and justwhatever happens happens I love
that, ty, and I have actuallydiscussed that, that idea a lot
on the podcast already and, justyou know, between the two of us
(16:39):
.
Speaker 2 (16:39):
But just the idea of creating the conditions.
You use the word contrive, whichI, which I love a lot it's got
a little bit more of a negativeconnotation to it.
It's manufacturing the space tobe surprised for the accidents
to occur and I almost thinkthere's a little bit of I don't
want to say selfishness in it.
(17:00):
But when you talk about thatPressfield quote of discovering
ourselves, there's somethingabout that process of discovery
of whether it's when you loadthe images and look at them for
the first time, not knowing whatyou're going to see, or, ty,
pulling up the piece ofcardboard, having an idea,
having created the conditionsfor something to happen, and
(17:22):
that's kind of the beautifulthing about the artistic process
.
I think general is that when wehave, the more time we spend,
it comes back to repetition,right, the more time you spend,
the more images that you capture, the more you can not replicate
but at least, again, create asmany of the conditions, as many
of the elements to sort ofsprinkle in the mix and just
(17:43):
kind of see what comes out.
Right, yeah, totally yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:46):
Yeah, it's a it's.
It's like.
I love it, Like now.
I literally used to hate beingin a studio.
Now there's nowhere else.
I'd rather be, because everyshoot is different.
Something I don't know.
Yeah, it's always surprising me.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
I love that.
Let's move on to your nextquote.
This is by Basquiat.
I like kids' work more thanwork by real artists any day.
I like kids' work more thanreal artists any day.
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:13):
I could see some eyebrows raising about that one.
But man, I literally just foundthat quote this morning,
because you ought to spellquotes.
I was like I know I'd heardBasquiat say some things that I
liked, but I never remember that.
I just found it this morning.
Anyway, the reason I love thatand connect to it is because
I've said the same thing many,many times.
(18:35):
Because having kids, when I goto my kids' schools and I walk
through the hallways and I seeall the art projects, I freaking
come to life.
Yeah, and the reason I do isbecause to see purely, I mean in
its rawest, purest form, achild's imagination yes,
(18:57):
scribbling.
Because all adults, with nomatter what artist you name,
we're all thinking about whetherit's how to monetize this, how
to impress people, how to dothis, express oneself.
They're thinking about all thethings we're talking about.
They're thinking about socialmedia, what's going to get likes
, how are people going torespond?
(19:19):
But when you look at a child'sart, it's just so innocent and
many times way cooler than youknow a lot of adult art, and so
I sometimes I like want to buy apiece, like off the wall of a
children's school.
But then I'm like a creeperbecause I'm like this adult,
like you know, walking throughthe hallways of the school but I
(19:42):
literally can look atchildren's like the younger gosh
that sounds even worse.
But like the younger the child,the more innocent their art is,
like, even like a toddler justthrowing paint around, actually
a little older, like aroundkindergarten to like third grade
when they draw portraits,because I'm so fascinated with
(20:04):
portraits, but the way theycreate faces and it's just like
I'm like, yes, that's it, that'sit, that's what I want to see,
you know, uh.
But of course there'sgazillions of amazing adult
artists.
But I just love that bosco saidthat because I'm like man, I
relate to that.
There was a recent airportexhibit, a massive airport
(20:26):
exhibit of children's art, and Ijust spent like an hour just
staring at all these kids'paintings and drawings because I
just think it's so inspiring.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
You use the word pure , and I think that's about the
best way one could describe theart.
That comes from a child, and Ithink it's a product of not yet
being self-conscious, you knowFor sure.
And that's what.
I don't care what age you are.
It's funny you said there.
I was actually thinking in mymind.
I'm like I wonder about whenthat starts to sort of fade a
(20:58):
little bit, cause it does forsure.
I was talking to somebody theother day and and um and I'm
sure you get this a lot too youtalk to people who are are not
creatives will say things likeoh yeah, I don't have a creative
bone in my body, and it's likewell, you, you, you did at one
point you know, you probablystill Well, the other quote is
in there.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
Every child is born an artist.
The problem is how to remainone.
That's right Once we grow up.
You know from Picasso that'sjust it, right.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
It's like you know you'll never walk into the
classroom of kindergartners andfind somebody, find a kid who's
like I don't know how to, Idon't know how to draw.
It's like give me the crayons,give me the markers, let me, let
me get after it.
Yeah, and so so much of it.
I think, um, and I'm with you.
I think that the art that Ireally appreciate is something
where there's evidence of bothcontrol and spontaneity.
(21:49):
You know, in a way, thatspontaneity, though, is really
something that it's, it's, it's,it's, it's pure, because it's
in the moment, right.
It's pure because it's a productof, of play, without concern
for the product, you know,without concern for the result,
without concern for how it'sgoing to be received or, to your
point, you know how many likesit's going to get.
(22:10):
I, I really we've got kids aboutthe same age.
I really wonder, I really fearfor how the impact of you know,
things like social media impactor affect kids' creativity, and
there I can just imagine, I'mjust trying to project or
imagine what it would have beenlike had social media been
(22:32):
around when I was a kid, growingup and drawing or whatever you
know.
Would I have shared it?
Who knows?
But just the idea of, I mean Iremember vividly, like walking
upstairs after you know, drawinga picture of Kirby Puckett
knowing I didn't get the handright on his, you know and being
like I hope mom likes this.
I hope you know what I'm sayingand magnify that by, however
(22:57):
right, an audience of infinitepeople that could potentially
see something once you put itout into the world.
I really wonder, I fear for howmuch that would cause creatives
of all ages to sort of editwhat they're doing in real time
and hold back.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
I could go on and on about the impact of all that,
the comparison, but I'veactually never thought about it
from an art standpoint for kids,and I just think about about
all the other things, thegeneral comparison and the
toxicity of it all.
And I just read the other daythat, finally, schools are
(23:34):
starting to not allow phones atall in the school.
I'm like, finally, right, youknow it's gotta happen, right,
it's a whole different topic.
Um, yeah, I thought about beinga high school and being able to
being afraid to post your artbecause of fear of you know,
right, yeah, that's huge.
I wish there was like anInstagram account that only
(23:54):
posted like children's drawingsand paintings like we're talking
about.
It'd be sick.
Yeah, my most followed account,yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:02):
I love that.
The next quote that you've goton our list for today.
Well done, by the way, this isa powerful list.
Eleanor Roosevelt said smallminds discuss people.
Average minds discuss events,great minds discuss ideas.
Speaker 3 (24:19):
Love, love that quote Craziest story.
Years ago I was in a group witha bunch of guys and we would
meet every week and at one pointa buddy of mine said to me he
was like you know what coward,you only hang out with cool and
important people.
You're too good for us.
And for like two or three weeksI was like really convicted by
(24:42):
that.
I was like I do hang out with alot of cool or important or
famous people.
But I was like is it becausethey're cool or important or
famous?
And after like literally tonsof just dwelling on that, that
statement, I finally realizedsomething.
I was like it has nothing to dowith their cool factor, their
(25:04):
followers or whatever.
What I realized is that groupof guys that I was hanging out
with every time we hung out itwas I hate my job, I hate my
boss, Everybody sucks.
Life is terrible.
This is a dream.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:19):
And what I realized is that I'm drawn to dreamers,
creators, doers, thinkers,ideators, and it doesn't matter
if they're cool.
Like I thought about theliteral hundreds of hours I have
spent in this building meetingwith kids, meeting with
(25:40):
teenagers and college studentsand just people that want to
discuss ideas, want to get myfeedback, want to pick my brain,
all that stuff, and I love itbecause we're discussing ideas.
Those people aren't cool,they're not important or famous
or whatever, and I don't care ifit's the janitor in the
building.
I want to discuss how do wemake this world a better place?
(26:03):
How do we drink?
What are you working on?
What are you going to do withyour life?
What are you passionate about?
And so it just so happens thatpeople that are cool or
important or famous are doers.
They got there because theychase ideas and they chase
dreams.
And so that that quote byEleanor Roosevelt just hit home.
(26:24):
Because, like when I go to I'msure the same way with our kids
you go to like kids gatherings,athletic events, whatever you're
with as a parent and all theother dads are like talking
about again people or events.
It's like they're gossiping orthey're talking about I don't
know, stock market or politics,or last night's baseball game or
(26:47):
lebron james, which I love,sports too and I'm not saying we
can't talk about those things.
Uh, I certainly do talk aboutpeople and events.
But I just come to life whenI'm with you and or drew or
anybody else where we'rediscussing ideas.
Yeah, um, ideas meaning any ofthose topics you know, like,
(27:08):
what are we doing with the list?
Because being a creative of anykind is essentially like old
school being a hunter, like what, how are you going to provide
this month?
What are you doing?
What are you doing?
You know, we're not just havingthese boring nine to five jobs,
we're just we hate it and wewere just there to get a
paycheck, like.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
So it's fascinating to me to hang out and spend time
with literally any othercreative, whether they're cool
or not, I don't care, you know,yeah, so have you figured out a
way to skip through all of thesmall talk and BS and get to the
idea part with people thatmaybe don't go there, naturally?
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Yeah, I try to.
I mean, it's hard too, ascreatives, like not to talk
about ourselves because, like Iam so passionate about what I do
for a living, I could talkabout this stuff all day, and
I've learned that that's aturnoff to most people, because
they don't like their jobs, theydon't want to talk about work,
right?
So when I talk about my work,it can come across as cocky or
(28:13):
arrogant, because I'm talkingabout myself, and I've had to
like really reconcile thatbecause I don't think I'm an
arrogant person, I just lovewhat I do.
And so, um, yeah, I try to likeask questions like what, what
do you?
What are you passionate about?
If you don't like your job,well then what do you want to do
?
Well, I'd like to quit my jobone day and do this, and I'm
like, well, why don't you Like?
(28:35):
Time is ticking, life is short,like we just talked about.
You know, each of us have losta sibling and so, like man, life
is just way too short to notgive it a go and try to pursue
what you love.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
That's so true.
I think that reminds me ofsomething that I began to
understand just in the last fewyears here.
But I think that the moreyou're living in passion and
living with purpose, let's justsay to you know, throw some
cliches in the mix, but I thinkit naturally leads to less
patience for bullshit I thinkmost creatives have.
(29:15):
I won't speak for you, but I'mgoing to take an educated guess
and assume that I'm right aboutthis.
You, me, we have a thousandideas that are going to pop
through.
You know what I mean.
Just getting our coffees on theway over here, just seeing the
cracks in this beautifulbuilding and the floors, oh,
that's a beautiful, that's anice mark.
(29:36):
Let me capture it.
You know, there's alwayssomething, captain, that's
probably a product of the ADD,that I feel we may share as well
.
But I don't want to reserve anyspace in the finite amount of
time and whatever bandwidth thatI have to put towards BS or
(29:58):
things that don't lendthemselves to doing something,
making a contribution, makingsomething right, creating yeah,
yeah, it's just.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
yeah, it's way too short and even I mean, I have a
uh weird neurological diseasethat I'm fighting against and so
, yeah, I'm like facing my owndaunting physical challenges and
so I feel like even more I'vegot this race against time to
crank out stuff and do what Ilove, and so it's amazing how
(30:29):
much that impacts things forsure.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Can I ask you more specifically how that affects
the way you think about yourwork?
Speaker 3 (30:36):
Yeah, you know, it's funny, because this studio setup
thing that I did never wasbecause of my disease, because
my disease didn't really startgetting bad until the last year
or two.
But it's amazing how that justcollided, because now I just get
to stand behind a tripod andbasically stand still when I
(30:57):
shoot.
I don't have to be on locationand sitting up a million lights
and gear by myself.
See, it doesn't impact thingstoo much right now.
It would have our out, it wouldhave I was doing what you do.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
Sorry, you and ty you and ty both.
How you think about your work,though, how you approach what
you're doing on, yeah, whatevertimeline, or however you think
about that, I don't think myhealth stuff affects how I think
about it.
Speaker 3 (31:23):
Now I gotta just do what I got to do and figure it
out, right, yeah.
But I do watch even your videosand Ty's videos, like how
physical it is.
I mean, man, I love to do thatkind of work, but I don't think
I could.
My body could be bent over onmy knees all day, yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
Right, it's a lot.
The clock's ticking for all ofus.
Yeah, for sure, for sure.
The next quote you've got forus is um, from oscar wilde, and
this is an often shared quote.
Yeah, for a good reason.
Speaker 3 (31:58):
Be yourself, everyone else is taken yeah, I just, for
a million reasons, love thatquote.
It's kind of.
It's kind of similar to to thePicasso every child is born an
artist, like right now my13-year-old girl.
She's African-American fromHaiti and she wants to look like
(32:18):
a white girl and I'm liketrying to tell like when she has
a fro, it is truly the mostgorgeous thing ever.
Like she just looks.
Everybody agrees, like we allfreak out the rare moment she
has a fro.
And I was just telling her lastweek I'm like why do you want to
be like all the other people,like you're so gorgeous, so
(32:40):
unique, so special, and your froonly accentuates that, only,
like highlights that.
And I understand I mean, we allwent to middle school and there
is this you got to wear whateverybody else wear and do what
everybody else is doing.
But I'm trying to drill on themlike no, like be special, like
I was a weirdo and in highschool and I've always done
(33:03):
things differently and I feellike the older you get every
year, the more you're respected.
And not that it's about beingrespected, but still, society
responds to uniqueness, youngcreativity and um, yeah, man,
there's too much uh, uniformityout there, like everybody.
Like when I get in new yorkcity or anywhere.
(33:24):
That's not the South like.
Even around here everybodylooks the same, dresses the same
, and I just come to life when Igo to New York City and see
just this blend of humanity andeverybody doing their own unique
thing.
I just love it.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
Yeah, yeah, originality and the whole idea
of being yourself.
I mean, that's a lifelongpursuit.
I can't speak for you, but Ifeel as though I'm still.
I'm consistently amazed at howwho I am continues to evolve and
my understanding and connectionto what is our true self, yeah,
(34:01):
and that's something thatdoesn't just happen naturally.
I think that probably is aproduct, I suspect, of being
somewhat introspective andintentional.
I mean, as creatives, we tendto spend a lot of time in our
heads thinking about maybeourselves or maybe what we're
going to do with everythingthat's flowing through here.
But I just wonder what it wouldtake for the typical that
(34:26):
sounds so condescending to saythe average, typical person, you
know, not folks like us?
but that sounds so terrible tosay there's a better way of
framing that but just like howmore of us we, the collective,
we people could continue tospend time.
Because those are the people toyour other point.
Those are the people who aremost interesting to me, are the
(34:48):
ones who are continuing toconsider what am I doing here?
Like what's really the you know?
To your point about hey, you'vegot a dream, why aren't you,
you know, pursuing it?
You know, what are we doinghere?
Like what's the?
Where's this heading?
You know, as opposed to, well,this is the one way path that
(35:08):
I'm on, and keep it between youknow, 55 and 61 and you know,
off we go.
you know, I don't know what mypoint is.
I think I have one, but maybeit'll come out in a moment, but
I just there's tremendous value,I think, in being intentional.
Actually, I'll ask you do youhave, is there anything around
your habits, routines, anypractice that you have to spend
(35:30):
time, you know, with yourself,continuing to get to know you
know who you are today, asopposed to getting, maybe, stuck
in identity that you assumed atsome point in the past?
Speaker 3 (35:41):
Not necessarily a routine or practice.
Necessarily a routine orpractice, um, but I have
realized, over the last twoyears especially, that
obsessively learning is like theonly path forward.
Um, I think when you stoplearning, that is the fastest
path to burnout irrelevance,boredom, like so, like we're
(36:04):
taught that you go to school,you learn your craft and then
you go do your craft.
You stop learning, like godknows so many artists in all
genres, where they're I don'tknow how old you are, but I'm 47
in their 40s, especially 50s,they, they sell out under the
sunset, usually against theirwill, but they become irrelevant
(36:27):
, they become washed up, theirold style, old work, and I think
the only way to truly stay ontop of your game is to always be
a student.
And the NFT.
I should tell you a crazy story.
So two years ago, when the NFswere popping and that was the
thing I had this kid like keeppounding me.
(36:51):
I was down in art basel, miami,and this kid kept uh, dming me.
He's like, hey, let's gettogether and chat nfts.
And I was like, hey, no, I haveno injuries.
They intimidate me and I don'twant to.
You know I I was like nope, I'mout.
Actually, I tried it a littlebit, no success, and I just gave
(37:11):
up.
So I was like I really don'twant to.
And then he just kept pushingme.
So we get together and heexplains something called
generative code, which that'swhen it just exploded in my
brain.
In all these years of paintingand doing photoshop layers, I
(37:33):
instantly like just got it withwith generative code.
Generative code essentially isit's not ai.
A generative code is likehaving a studio system explore
all the combination of elements.
For you it's an invisiblestudio system.
And so I was like man, I couldcreate, and I literally created
(37:57):
nine, almost a thousandindividual pieces of art.
I've had our layers, canvas,polaroids, photoshop, ipad art,
layers, canvas, polaroids,photoshop, photographs, like all
this art.
And I threw it into what he hadtold me about generative code
and I created all this crazy artthat has never in the history
of the world been done before.
(38:18):
And I made a collection.
So I obsessively learned forlike three months how to do all
that release this collection.
When NFTs were a thing that intwo seconds made $700,000.
Literally Two seconds, wow.
We thought someone was wrong,we thought there was a technical
(38:40):
glitch, but it had sold outthat fast, wow.
But then the story keeps going.
So that opened up my nftjourney and then I just started
learning, learning, learningevery day, and then I finally
learned augmented reality, arand vr and I started playing
with all that stuff and anyway,I had a bunch more success with
nfts but my um diving into ar.
(39:05):
Then somebody was reminding mewe're starting a tech company
and they showed me what theywere doing with tech and I
brought all my knowledge of NFTsand AR to the table.
I was like y'all should reallybe doing AR.
And so they freaked out,brought me on as a partner, and
so now I'm a partner in thosetech company that is just
(39:28):
exploded and we're now workingwith the biggest artists on the
planet.
Uh, truly like I mean, we haveall the big country artists and
pop artists.
We now have nfl teams, majorleague baseball teams and nhl
hockey teams and I'm a partnerin this tech company.
And it's all because, rewindingto the moment in Florida when
(39:50):
this kid is like hey, you shouldreally learn this stuff, and
I'm like no, no, no, like mostpeople when they're older are
like no, that's for the kids,that's for the.
You know, tiktok is for justteenagers dancing, and look at
it now.
It's like everything everyone'son tiktok and reels and all the
things.
Um, it's a very long way ofsaying that that that all taught
(40:13):
me that.
Oh, I just learned the newthings and it changed my life
yeah because I'm obsessivelylearning and so now I'm like,
okay, moving forward, whateverit is, whatever it is, whatever
the next AI, ar, vr, nft,whatever the thing is, I'm going
to keep staying on the cusp ofthat before everybody else, so
(40:34):
that I can just keep figuring itout and not become bored.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
I love that story for a lot of reasons.
So, knowing your backstory andyour trajectory, you know a
little bit, you've dipped yourpen in a lot of creative ink.
You know you've done a lot ofdifferent things, and correct me
if I'm wrong, but I'm guessingyou could have, at any point at
different points along the way,sort of camped out and become
more static with, like, allright, I kind of got a groove
(40:59):
that would have paid the billsand taken care of things right
indefinitely.
So, to put that in the form ofa question, I'm curious do you
think it's a conscious choicethat you made at some point
along the way to say I'm goingto be somebody who continues to
evolve, or do you think that'sjust baked into your DNA?
It's?
Speaker 3 (41:15):
baked into being off the charts.
Atd, sure, yeah, and justgenerally curious.
I mean, I'm always shifting.
A lot of people do think that'spurposeful, but it's really not
.
It's just.
I think it's like actualextreme ADHD a lot of career
switching and there's a ton ofdownside to it.
(41:37):
We're talking about it rightnow as if it's this really cool,
sexy thing, but I couldprobably point out more
downsides to this than I couldpositives.
There's a lot of regret withsome of the things I've
abandoned, things that I shouldhave stuck with.
You know, could have supportedwhat I do now.
(41:58):
So, yes, it's awesome and it'sawful all at once.
Speaker 2 (42:00):
Right, right, yeah.
But to your point aboutlearning, though, too.
I think that's such animportant thing to realize is
that there's so much opportunityfor additional growth just
laying out in the world likelittle Easter eggs just all over
the place for us to just pickup.
And everything contributes toeverything.
(42:21):
Everything leads to the nextthing.
Right, everything contributes.
So you know things that you've.
I think about it a lot as aspicking up.
Well, for me it's picking upliteral tools and adding
additional physical tools thatare going to make different
marks and create differenteffects, you know, with my work.
But I also think about the ideaof adding figurative tools to
my sort of tool bag and notreally knowing how or when
(42:44):
they're going to reoccur, howthey're going to be useful again
, and then realizing I don'tknow if I've shared this in a
podcast before, but I had thisthis um, I don't know if you
remember this movie.
It was called uh, it was an Mnight Shyamalan, I can't say
this last name wrong.
That movie signs oh, yeah, okay.
So if you remember that there'sa scene that, as the film sort
(43:18):
of comes to an end, it's likethe last dramatic scene where
Joaquin Phoenix was a baseballplayer and his career, had he
got injured or something likethat, came to an end and that
was, I think, a big part of hissort of character arc was just
how he was depressed about notbeing able to pursue his dream
of playing baseball.
And the last scene culminateswhere they realize that and I'm
probably butchering this, butthis is how my memory is giving
it back to me at the moment butis that these aliens are, they
can only be, whatever killed ordealt with?
Water, yeah, yeah.
And that last scene wherethere's a glass of water and
(43:40):
Joaquin Phoenix grabs a bat andis able to because he knows how
to swing it swing away.
Merrill hits a glass of waterand is able to save, save his
family.
The point being, I don't knowwhy this sort of triggered
something for me, but the pointis that we never know what
little tools, skills, abilities,experiences, little nuggets of
knowledge that we've sort ofpicked up along the way are
(44:03):
going to be useful later.
Yeah, absolutely.
So.
That's kind of a mantra, youknow, for for me and other
people that I enjoy being indialogue with is just like
there's.
No, there's.
I've never read a book and, andbeen worse for it, I've never,
you know, had it, had it at anengaging conversation and not
(44:23):
you never.
But we just never know.
It's kind of the point and wedon't need to right.
You don't have to have a planwith what you're going to do
with something or oh, this isgoing to lead to right.
It's very rarely, if ever, alinear path A goes to, b goes to
.
We were talking aboutassembling Ikea furniture
earlier.
It's not.
Life ain't like that.
Exactly it's not.
(44:44):
If only life was just aassemble by number, you know, uh
, swedish made uh.
Speaker 3 (44:51):
But if you just open up your mind to just like I've
got to be curious, instead ofsaying no, that's not for me,
especially when it comes to thearts and creativity, like, open
up your mind, just try it, justdo it, just jump into the new
thing and give it a go and mostexperiences are so low stakes.
Speaker 2 (45:09):
What if you try something that doesn't work?
Yeah, exactly it's okay, you'reabout right back where you were
when you before you started.
Yeah, um, yeah, I love that.
So next quote I don't actuallyknow how to pronounce jessica's
last name, I don't know.
I don't know who this?
Is okay, yeah, do you happen toknow what she does, or her?
she's an illustrator illustratorokay fantastic, all right, so I
should probably know that.
Her quote the work you makewhile you're procrastinating on
(45:32):
your work is the work you shouldactually be making.
Yeah, I'm gonna read that againthe work you make while you're
procrastinating on your work isthe work you should actually be
making.
Yeah, talk to us about that.
Speaker 3 (45:43):
So good, yeah, I know jessica, um, she's so talented
but she nailed it.
I mean, like, if you're overhere just doing something out of
your pure passion on the side,uh, and just whether it's
doodles or art or wood making,like whatever you're doing like
that should be.
If that's what brings you joy,why not try to figure out how to
(46:06):
make that your actual thing?
And a lot of people would say,well then it removes the joy if
I'm monetizing it or trying to,which that could be true.
But I just can speak fromexperience.
Like I'm now 25 years into justchasing I don't doodle on the
side, like why I get to doodleprofessionally.
(46:27):
I get to just constantly shiftand try new things.
And, um, there's never been aday that I've dreaded, uh, a
monday, or I've never lookedforward to the weekends, like
this is where I want to be, whatI want to be doing.
And um, yeah, I mean if there'sanybody out there that's
listening and know they're doingthat little fun thing on the
(46:48):
side that they consider just alittle whatever, like maybe
that's the answer, but they'redoing that thing on the side and
saying I don't know what I'mgoing to do with my life.
I think she's saying that it'sright there.
Yeah, it's the thing you'redoing, yeah.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
And I think there's obviously a lot of details like
that thing might not be able tobe monetized, but I, of those
passions and some of thosecuriosities, if we're willing to
cross other things off the list, you know, I mean, if I'm, this
is true for me and I, I would,I would imagine probably most
people, if we did a, if you do atrue time audit, like a block
by block, like where's where'sthe time, you know, really going
, we all could find Where's thetime really going.
We all could find a couplehours here and there.
(47:47):
Oh, without a doubt, 15 minuteshere, right, without a doubt.
To do more of the thing thatreally stirs our soul, whether
we're fortunate enough, like youand I, to be able to do this
full time, or whether it's justcarving out a little.
It doesn't, I mean and that'simportant too Like it doesn't
have to become the thing thatpays all your be great if it did
(48:08):
.
But either whether it's justsomething you do on the side
that really just stirs your soul, or whether it's something that
becomes, you know, somethingbigger.
It starts in the same place andwhere it goes from there, you
know, really isn't up to usanyway.
For sure, yeah, for sure, Ilove it.
Tom York, heard of him.
(48:28):
What's your favorite, sorry,what's your greatest strengths?
And I actually I want to saythis so, um, so I listened to
your book in preparation for ouruh, for our, our conversation
today, and I just want to sharethis for our audience.
It's fantastic.
It's called I'm possible and um.
The audio version is read byyou, which I also really
appreciate because it's one ofmy most.
(48:49):
One of my biggest pet peeves iswhen authors don't read their
own words.
Speaker 1 (48:53):
Cause, even if there's a voice talent, that's
like better at talk.
Speaker 2 (48:56):
It's just not.
You know what I mean.
So you did a great job ofperforming and reading it as
well.
So I'm anyway, I'll just sharethis as a as an aside.
I was, um, when I was listeningto your book.
You opened with the story ofyour Tom York piece, which, if
you're not following Jeremy, youshould be, and so I'm listening
to this actually on a run.
I'm like man, I wish I couldsee this piece, and then you
(49:17):
reposted it on your Instagramand I was just like wow, that's
even better than you described.
That's awesome, so super, supercool.
So Tom said what's yourgreatest strength?
It's that I don't know what I'mdoing.
Speaker 3 (49:33):
Yeah, just again I found this morning when I was
kind of digging around, andthat's so Tom York to say.
But I just relate to that.
I think artists look at peopleyoung artists look at guys like
me and you and girls and theythink that we know what we're
doing.
And I really just don't.
(49:54):
I mean, I'm always going inquestioning myself.
There's always insecurity,there's always doubt, there's
always I suck.
I mean last year, goodnessgracious.
Last year was probably thehardest year I've ever had in
terms of self-doubt.
I mean, I was in the gutterlast year.
I was like everything I dosucks.
(50:15):
I don't know what I'm going todo for a living.
All my work is gone and if he'scrashed it's real bad and I
don't know what I'm doing.
And so, yeah, I just love thatout of anybody.
Tom York says that you know,and I just think it's a really
important thing for artists tohear, because I think Chuck
(50:37):
Close said, inspiration is foramateurs.
The rest of us just show up andget to work.
You know, like, even though Idon't know what I'm doing, I
just keep going.
That doesn't stop me.
Maybe that's the differencewith people like you and I it's
like, yeah, we don't know whatwe're doing.
And we do have the doubt andthe insecurity and all the
things, but literally every daywe just keep going 100%, keep
(51:00):
throwing stuff at the wall andseeing what sticks.
Speaker 2 (51:04):
In spite of those insecurities, doubts, fears,
yeah, neuroticism in all itsmany forms yeah, showing up the
next day to do something.
So you do know, you do know onething you're doing it's you're
showing up the next day to dosomething yeah I mean that's,
and I think that that'ssomething that is.
It's one of the most encouragingthings.
I don't remember when I when Ifirst sort of heard this or or
(51:28):
acknowledge this idea or thistruth that nobody really knows
what they're doing.
The only difference is thatsome people have become really
good at at convincing othersthat they do.
Speaker 3 (51:41):
That is for dang sure .
Speaker 2 (51:42):
Well, we're all making it up as we go.
You know and I think that's oneof the most encouraging things
that that anybody could everreally fully grasp is like oh
all the all, I pick, pick yourfavorite, whatever, the most
inspirational figures in anydomain.
They woke up every day and werelike, oh, we'll see how this
(52:04):
goes.
Yeah, right you know, and so ifone of the you know I mean, yeah
, tom York Radiohead would be onmy you know, certainly Mount
Rushmore of creative heroes andthe fact that this is going to
be funny because we talked aboutthis in an episode a couple
episodes ago but just the wholeidea of how often he they
(52:27):
reinvented themselves over timeTo us we might think, oh, they
were absolutely fearless andjust said we're just going to do
whatever we want.
But if we read into this quote,we could probably surmise that
with each album they're likewell, this is what we feel
called, this is what we feelpassionate about putting out
(52:52):
into the world.
And thankfully they hadobviously created some space for
some success to have a label belike all right, sure, I mean,
there's a little bit of caveatthere, but the point is
everybody has doubts and fearsand everyone's experiencing, no
matter where you're at in yourtrajectory and your career and
whatever thing you were tryingto progress in.
(53:12):
Yeah, it's normal, it's justpart of it.
Speaker 3 (53:15):
Yeah, exactly Just all the kids out there,
especially college students.
Yeah, just got to embrace itand that's part of the journey
you're signing up for.
Speaker 2 (53:26):
And continue to take action in spite of right,
because there's that whole, youknow, analysis or paralysis by
analysis, where we can try tojust continue to collect all the
information and try, and, youknow, chart a perfect course,
and it's like good luck, youknow.
I mean, all I know is that I'mgoing to take a left from here
and then we'll see what the next, where the next intersection
(53:46):
brings me.
You know what color the lightis, you know.
Next quote the best thing abouta picture is that it never
changes, even when the people init do.
The best thing about a pictureis that it never changes Even
when the people in it do.
You take first crack at that,cause I love it Again.
Speaker 3 (54:09):
I just I've got a lot more quotes and I mentioned
some of them today that thatit's not like these are my
favorite quotes of all time,like that one I literally found
today.
But that one hit me Causethat's what I do, is I take
pictures of people every singleday.
Sometimes I think.
I think my record is about 165shoots in one day, literally 165
portrait sessions.
(54:30):
Um, wow, and I might have toput that quote somewhere here in
the studio, because a portraitreally is this chapter marker,
like if your life is a wholebook, like we all love pictures
and books to break up the textand to stop and look at
something yeah like if your lifeis a book and it's going to
(54:51):
have a few portraits scatteredthroughout, like a portrait just
captures that, that chapter,whether it's a divorce,
depression, the best day ever,like whatever it is it captures
that and the story keepsevolving.
And I just love that quotebecause that is what I'm doing.
The picture is there forever,but your life, your story, is
(55:14):
going to keep changing, couldeven change the day after that
picture happened.
But I love just that briefsecond of time that you're
forever frozen in this portrait,which is why I do what I do.
Speaker 2 (55:27):
It's interesting because I think forgive me, I'm
blanking on the name of theproject that you started in
taking portraits, the.
Speaker 3 (55:36):
Help Portrait yeah.
Speaker 2 (55:38):
Can you talk about that a little bit, and I've got
a follow-up question to that.
I think it's a beautifulproject, thank, you.
Speaker 3 (55:44):
He has a real simple idea before social media uh, to
take pictures of people in needand print them and give them
away.
That was it.
That was the end of the agenda.
No portfolio, no use, no selfrewards for the photographers,
just take pictures, give themaway.
Um, so we did it once in 2007,and then we used blogs at the
(56:09):
time to spread the word, and thenext year it was in 45
countries and then it became aglobal movement and we've taken
over a million portraits sincethen and like 80, 90 countries,
and so, um, I find thateverybody wants to help, but a
lot of times people don't knowhow to help and they don't
(56:30):
necessarily want to help in waysthat are not gifted or skilled
at.
Like, it's not everybody'sthing to go serve food at the
mission or to go clean awarehouse or whatever the thing
may be, but if you tellphotographers, use your camera
and go to this thing andphotograph people, it's just
crazy what happened.
It was a very simple idea thatI chased um.
Speaker 2 (56:54):
That turned into this literal worldwide movement the
power of portrait, though I'dactually like to.
I've thought a lot about the.
Speaker 3 (57:03):
I mean so yeah, so I'm sorry, I kind of missed the
question.
Let me speak into that.
So, yeah, we've.
We have literally seen peoplewalking the streets a year and
two years later, still holdingthe framed portrait that they
got.
Um, there's this old, old storyfrom like the 1800s about a war,
uh, where people walking aroundnaked they had nothing.
(57:26):
Uh, where people walking aroundnaked, they had nothing.
There was no food, no water, no, anything, but somebody shipped
a massive um cart of redlipstick and so all these women
were walking around town.
They had nothing.
You know, there is the middleof war.
They were hungry, they weretired, but this red lipstick
(57:49):
gave them this massive sense ofbeauty, dignify, like I feel
good, I at least have my redlipstick.
And the same kind of holds trueof what we do with Help
Portrait, like we're stillgiving them that.
They walk around being ignored,being spat spat on, being just
looked down upon by society.
(58:09):
So, for a brief moment, to givethem this here here's who you
really are, with your hair,makeup done in your shower.
We're giving you new clothes.
We're giving you all this newstuff, giving you professional
lighting and showing you who youreally are, like that this is
your full self and so for themto hold on to that and be able
(58:30):
to go get a job with it, whichwe've had done send it to their
loved ones.
They haven't seen in decades.
We've seen that Like.
It's so powerful.
I mean hundreds and hundreds ofstories that I could share from
13 years of doing this.
Speaker 2 (58:49):
It's crazy the power of just one image, though.
Yeah, it's a, it's a, it's alittle time capsule.
For sure, we, we we talkedabout this a little bit before
we started rolling too but Ithink, especially when you think
about, you know, grief, loss,the things that are left behind
when the person you know nolonger is yeah, that's your, no
longer is, yeah, that's yourbrother's shirt, yeah, like
(59:10):
that's.
That's a.
There's something to thatlittle like this is this is.
This moment will never happen.
You know, you take a photo likethat, that's it.
That's, that's frozen in time,that's never gonna.
You couldn't replicate it evena second later, at least not
exactly you know and I thinkthere's just something about
having those little things tohave a connection to.
(59:31):
It's one of the things that Ilove about your work photography
, you know, in general, just theability to document an
experience, a time and an energy.
I mean that's something, too,you know.
I think that the art ofphotography is capturing, you
know, someone's energy, theirmood, and the fact that you put
(59:52):
as much of your heart and soul,maybe even more, into those
portraits of the homeless thatyou do into the famous people
that millions of people aregoing to see on the cover of
magazines and album covers Likethat's just really beautiful.
Speaker 3 (01:00:10):
Well, thank you, yeah , yeah, it's been an amazing
thing to be a part of.
Yeah, for sure it's neat.
Speaker 2 (01:00:16):
Let's talk.
Let's close with this.
This is something that youbrought to the table and I, I'm,
I'm, I'm interested in wherethis goes.
But what's an artist, jeremy?
Speaker 3 (01:00:25):
I don't know why, but for some reason I've thought
way too much about this questionwhat is an artist?
And a few years ago I finallycame up with what I think is
just like the right way to framewhat an artist is.
I think an artist is somebodythat if they were the only
person left on Earth with thatwill smith movie where he was
(01:00:49):
the only guy on earth I forgetwhat it's called um jew's not a
little left to remember that Iwant to say I am robot, but
that's not it.
Speaker 2 (01:00:57):
That's what I wanted to say it's not a robot no, it's
something else.
Speaker 3 (01:01:00):
Anyway, if you're the only person on earth yeah,
there's no one to see your work,there's no one to like your
post, there's just no audiencewould you keep creating?
If the answer is yes, I thinkyou're an artist.
Yeah, like, in other words, youhave to do it.
Yeah, it's a form of breathing.
It doesn't matter what you'recreating.
If you have to create tosurvive, I think that I think
(01:01:25):
that's an artist.
Audience or no audience, that'swho artists are.
Speaker 2 (01:01:30):
I agree with that, and I think that the term artist
can be extended to reallyanything that involves a version
of self-expression.
People, whether they're awareof it or not, it doesn't really
matter, quite frankly, whetherit is a conscious thing that
registers or not, there isexpression.
To that.
There is something to be saidfor there's there's a, there's a
(01:01:51):
, there's a personal I.
I'm putting a little piece ofme into this thing that I'm
doing because I love doing it,because I would do it, whether
anybody else was there to see itor go about it regardless.
Yeah, agreed, that feels like agood place to end.
Yeah, man.
Yeah, thank you so much for thetime, of course, great to meet
you and for everybody listening,definitely go check out
(01:02:13):
Jeremy's work.
Where can people find you?
Speaker 3 (01:02:16):
At Jeremy Cowart on Instagram and all socials on
jeremycowartcom.
Speaker 2 (01:02:22):
Amazing.
Thank you, brother.
Thanks man Appreciate it.
Yep, thanks man Appreciate it.
This is Ty Nathan Clark and I'm coming to you on
an early, humid, rainy Texasmorning.
It's 6.30am and I've beenarriving at my studio between
5.30 and 6.30 these days to getto work before it turns into
probably about 120 degree oven.
That is a Texas studio in thesummers and it's usually about
(00:31):
that hot around 10 am in themorning, so I try to get a few
hours in before the heat wavecomes.
But anyways, nathan a few weeksago called me and said he was
heading to Nashville for a bitand he wanted to know if I had
any artist friends in Nashvillethat he could have as a guest
co-host on the show, and so,without hesitation, I said hell
(00:52):
yes, my buddy, jeremy Cowart,let me call him now.
So you are in for a treat today, as we have our second guest
co-host on the show with Nathanfrom Nashville.
His name is Jeremy Cowart, and afew years back Jeremy was named
the internet's most influentialphotographer, and I don't know
(01:14):
if I have met somebody who isconstantly chasing ideas in
every direction, here and there,as they lead him as much as
myself.
Well, that person is JeremyCowart.
100%.
He has been constantly findinghimself in new situations,
moments, successes and failures,all while dealing with his
(01:37):
life's hardships, which israising four kids who are
absolutely incredible.
One of his child, his specialneeds.
He's had radical loss in hisfamily, all while managing his
own neurological disease.
He is a 100% true inspirationto me, but an inspiration and
overcoming and continuing tomake art against all odds.
(01:58):
And, jeremy, I'm telling youeverybody has mastered pushing
resistance to the side and justmoving forward in work and
creating art.
He has always, as an artist,sat at the edge of innovation,
invention and evolution ofphotography, combining art and
technology into his processes,and he absolutely blows me away.
(02:23):
He has photographed.
The list is long, but I'm justgoing to name a few the likes of
Taylor Swift, emma Stone,gwyneth Paltrow, former
President Barack Obama, theKardashians, chris Stapleton,
sting, miley Cyrus, dolly Parton, imogen Heap, iron and Wine
Feist, brandi Carlile,christopher Guest, eugene Levy I
(02:45):
mean, the list goes on and onand on, and I'm so excited to
have Jeremy and Nathan today onthe episode bringing some quotes
from Picasso and Basquiat,eleanor Roosevelt, oscar Wilde
and Tom York.
It's going to be absolutelyincredible.
And a little bit about Jeremy in2008,.
Before social media, he usedthe blogging network to spread
(03:08):
this beautiful, simple idea tofind people in need and take
their photos, print the photosand give them away to the people
right after they took thepictures, and called it help
portrait.
Help portrait has become aglobal movement spanning 80 plus
countries and millions ofportraits they're going to talk
about a little bit in theepisode, and the stories since
(03:31):
2008 all over the world are justmind-blowing.
They're just so inspirational,incredible.
So in 2020, jeremy invented anew medium altogether and coined
the term lightograph todescribe it.
In his words, it means theevolution of light through a
still photograph is not a videobecause there's no motion and
it's not a photograph becausethe analog light is constantly
(03:54):
changing.
And to take it a step further,he decided to make them
interactive and meant them asNFTs, and so if you take your
finger or your cursor on amobile phone and you move over
the image, you'll notice thatyou get to control the analog
light in the portraits.
It's insane.
It's crazy.
He was featured.
This is incredible.
(04:15):
Jeremy was featured at the 2022Phillips auction in London
alongside photography greatsAnsel Adams, annie Leibovitz and
Richard Avedon, and more.
It's insane.
And in May 2023, he createdAuras.
This is probably one of myfavorite things 10,000
(04:37):
completely unique NFTs, producedin 20 minutes from start to
finish, without relying ongenerative code, and it was the
first time he ever revealed hiscreative process that he'd spent
10 years privately developingin the studio.
It's one of those things youhave to see to believe.
It's absolutely incredible, andNathan and Jeremy are going to
be coming from Jeremy's brandnew studio in Nashville today in
the episode where he is usinghis process and techniques and
(04:58):
offering 60 second photo shootsto the public.
So he'll shoot 200 portraits inone minute, with every portrait
having completely uniqueresults.
It's insane and you're going tosee if you're watching this on
Spotify or YouTube.
In the video version, you'regoing to be able to see one of
his screens behind him.
It just blows me away.
Jeremy says he doesn't set goalsor plan ahead and money never
(05:21):
motivates him.
It's always about the idea.
It always has been and italways will be.
Some of the ideas failmiserably, but the lessons
learned are invaluable.
So immediately I go chase thenext one.
I've done it for 20 years andI'll do it the rest of my life.
My hope is that the public seesmy love for art and love for
people throughout all of it.
(05:42):
That's from Jeremy Cowart, adear friend, an incredible
artist, peer, and I cannot waitfor you to hear his story, his
process of innovation,overcoming so many things that
he and Nathan jump into.
So let me get off here andlet's head out to Jeremy's brand
new, insane studio in Nashville, tennessee.
(06:02):
Nathan, take it away.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Jeremy, thanks for joining us today.
Of course, you are officiallyour second guest.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
Co-host is what we've been calling it, and you are my
official first anything in thisnew studio.
I love it Ever.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
We are christening the space Very much To talk
about for the people that arewatching on YouTube and watch
the video.
So we are sitting in front of a.
How big is this LED screen?
Speaker 3 (06:29):
It is 11 feet tall by 10 feet wide.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Amazing, and so the work behind us that is being
projected here is Jeremy's, andit's tremendous.
And I'm going to try to notlook behind me because I'll just
get distracted and I won't beable to focus on our
conversation, but that's supercool.
So thank you for having me.
Of course, I'm excited to behere in Nashville with you and
excited to get into some of thequotes that you've got laid out
here.
What we like to do with ourguest co-hosts is kind of have
(06:56):
you steer the ship with regardsto quotes that are meaningful to
you around the creative process, around art and just your whole
journey with art as well.
So we'll probably just jump inwith the first one on the list
here, I'll share it and thenI'll ask you to kind of take
your first pass at how itresonates with you and why it's
meaningful to you personally.
(07:17):
So the first quote that you gotfor us is learn the rules like
a pro so you can break them likean artist.
Picasso said that Learn therules like a pro so you can
break them like an artist.
Why is that quote meaningful toyou?
Why is that something thatresonates with you personally as
a creative?
Speaker 3 (07:36):
Yeah, because I think artists and creatives tend to
be a bit arrogant in there andwas I was the arrogant artist,
so I'm speaking from experience.
But earlier in my career I waslike I don't need to read the
manuals on how the light works,I don't need to know everything
about the camera, I'll just liveon intuition and I'll just do
(07:59):
my thing.
And that did work.
Actually, my career exploded inthe beginning, landed hollywood
agent and was off to the racesand I knew nothing about lights,
nothing about camera settings,nothing about cameras, like it
was all intuition.
And so that does work to adegree if you just have a gift
for seeing, for creating.
(08:21):
But then later in my career Istarted to get really, really
nerdy about what does this lightdo, what, what are the rules,
what, what, what can the camerado?
And so the more that I learnedall the things I didn't want to
learn in the beginning, the moreit just exploded.
(08:42):
My creativity, in fact myentire process in here now is
like the most technically absurdthing in the world, like I
don't know of anybody elseshooting the way I shoot.
Yeah, and it's because Ifinally overcame that mental
hurdle and ego of you know, I'lljust live on my whatever.
And so, yeah, like I think.
(09:03):
And then once you learn allthat, like picasso says, then
you go back to the, blow it allup and make weird shit and you
know, but the more you learntrue, I actually have a
variation not a variation thatquote but I always say the more
you learn technically, the moreyou can achieve creatively.
(09:24):
And so to all young artists,like, sure, like, lean on your
natural gifts and intuition, butI'm telling you, if you force
yourself to truly learneverything that every piece of
gear can do, you'll be blownaway at what can happen.
Yeah, I love that.
So.
So another analogy um, imagineyou're a carpenter, and if a
(09:48):
carpenter has nails and a hammerand wood, he can build certain
things right.
And but then if you start toadd to that toolbox and give him
, give him eventually abulldozer and who knows what
else, like, the more tools hehad, the more, more he can build
.
And it's exact same processwith creativity, a hundred
percent.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
So I mean, when you start talking about tools, now
you're really speaking mylanguage, yeah seriously,
seriously.
Speaker 3 (10:16):
So you're a perfect example.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
When you share that, I'm reminded of a story from
your, from your book about kindof the winging it version I
forget what the title, but thestory of when you were shooting
the uh for prison break, whichwas kind of like one of your
first big gigs right.
So would that be an example ofsort of figuring out on the fly?
Speaker 3 (10:36):
That's right.
It's gotta be one of the only,not the only, but it's not often
that a photographer gets hiredon a big job like that, learns
how to do his craft from his ownassistant, literally.
Because I got hired on that joband it was like a sound stage
of equipment like lights, andbecause we had the light eight
(10:58):
or to ten sets, yeah, with fiveto six lights per set, right, I
don't even know how to use thelight.
So I had to bs my way with myassistants because, like, what
do you want to do?
And I was like I was a kid andI was 28 years old yeah I was
like, yeah, just, you know moody, but I don't even know how to.
So but then watching my own crewset up my lights on my shoe and
(11:22):
I was like, oh, that's how youset up a light and that's how
you, you know 100, I learned byliterally just doing and
watching my own crews, you know,set stuff up yeah, so what
doors got open for youcreatively once you did develop
a level of competency or evenmastery, you know, with all the
(11:42):
many tools that you can use inyour particular craft.
What doors opened up?
Speaker 2 (11:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
Yeah, just people coming to me because I was doing
things really different.
And I was doing things reallydifferent because, like I was
just saying, I was learning thetools and learning how to master
it all.
So my other advantage was whenphotography switched from analog
to digital which I'm now reallydating myself because that's
(12:08):
been about 20 years I wasalready a graphic designer and
so I had this massive advantagebecause all these old school
film photographers were likewhat Computers, photoshop, like
what is this?
And so I was just like just 90miles an hour ahead, with way
ahead of the game, so early inmy career.
(12:28):
That's another reason I gothired.
So much is that I knew how todo things that no one else did,
right, um, which I guess weshould have started with that
background.
Is that, um, you know?
Uh, to rewind a bit, growing upI really just wanted to be a
painter.
That was my obsession all theway through childhood, high
(12:50):
school, college.
Then my parents were afraid ofme making a living as a painter.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Right.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
And so they were like , have you heard of this thing?
You know computers and graphicsand Photoshop?
I was like, oh hell, no, I waslike scared to death of
technology, of like going youknow all these computers thought
I was an idiot.
And so they, they sent me nowon this gosh, 30 year detour of
(13:17):
away from painting and fine artinto all things digital, which
is uh, which has been amazing,that they does the most
important thing they could haveever done.
But it's weird because I stillfeel like I'm just a painter,
stuck in this, this world ofcommercial and digital you know
it's crazy.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
Yeah, how do you think that impacts your, your
work or your approach to thework that you do?
Speaker 3 (13:41):
I actually shoot now very much like a painter, and
what I mean by that is I mean,the work you do is extremely,
first of all, beautiful.
I just saw his work for thefirst time today.
It's incredible.
Appreciate it.
But any abstract, we'll go tothe abstract painter, like even
(14:03):
Ty.
When I watch Ty's videos, he'soverseeing a process meant to
even surprise him.
He doesn't know where everysingle drip of paint is going to
land.
He's not controlling everylittle, but he is controlling
the overall vision and mostphotographers are.
(14:25):
It's the same thing.
They're expressing something.
They know where they went theirlife, they know where they went
their thing.
Steven Pressfield said mostartists are expressing
themselves.
The rest are discoveringthemselves.
That was probably the mostprofound like weight off my
shoulders, because all theseyears, even recently, I always
(14:49):
felt like, well, I'm not anartist if I'm not, like pouring
my soul onto the canvas andexpressing some traumatic event
or whatever, like I've justnever been that artist.
Like when I create, it'sdiscovering.
It's like I don't know what'sabout to happen.
I don't think ty, I don't thinkyourself really know, knows
(15:10):
what's about to happen, rightuntil you get in and you just,
you just do it, and so all thatto say a long way of saying that
this, what you're seeing rightnow in my studio, is a contrived
happy accident when it comes tophotography, like it's all
designed to surprise me.
I've got lights changing, I'vegot this wall changing backdrops
(15:31):
, I've got crap in front of thelens that's reflecting light,
prisms and all kinds of stuff,and when I shoot, the cool thing
about the process is no photocan be reproduced because I
don't know which background part, I don't know which light part,
I don't know which prismreflected which way, because I'm
even moving the prisms of theshoot and then you have somebody
(15:52):
standing in front of the cameraand whatever pose or expression
or thing they did.
So it's all this combination towhere that can't be done again,
and that's why I consider myform of photography is a form of
art and expression, reallydiscovery.
It really is like abstractpainting, because I used to be
in studios and I hated itbecause it was the same light,
(16:16):
the same angle, the samebackdrop, and so it's taken me
years to figure out how to shootlike a paint, which is just
like this wall behind us, whereit's just stuff dripping and
splattering and and justwhatever happens happens I love
that, ty, and I have actuallydiscussed that, that idea a lot
on the podcast already and, justyou know, between the two of us
(16:39):
.
Speaker 2 (16:39):
But just the idea of creating the conditions.
You use the word contrive, whichI, which I love a lot it's got
a little bit more of a negativeconnotation to it.
It's manufacturing the space tobe surprised for the accidents
to occur and I almost thinkthere's a little bit of I don't
want to say selfishness in it.
(17:00):
But when you talk about thatPressfield quote of discovering
ourselves, there's somethingabout that process of discovery
of whether it's when you loadthe images and look at them for
the first time, not knowing whatyou're going to see, or, ty,
pulling up the piece ofcardboard, having an idea,
having created the conditionsfor something to happen, and
(17:22):
that's kind of the beautifulthing about the artistic process
.
I think general is that when wehave, the more time we spend,
it comes back to repetition,right, the more time you spend,
the more images that you capture, the more you can not replicate
but at least, again, create asmany of the conditions, as many
of the elements to sort ofsprinkle in the mix and just
(17:43):
kind of see what comes out.
Right, yeah, totally yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:46):
Yeah, it's a it's.
It's like.
I love it, Like now.
I literally used to hate beingin a studio.
Now there's nowhere else.
I'd rather be, because everyshoot is different.
Something I don't know.
Yeah, it's always surprising me.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
I love that.
Let's move on to your nextquote.
This is by Basquiat.
I like kids' work more thanwork by real artists any day.
I like kids' work more thanreal artists any day.
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:13):
I could see some eyebrows raising about that one.
But man, I literally just foundthat quote this morning,
because you ought to spellquotes.
I was like I know I'd heardBasquiat say some things that I
liked, but I never remember that.
I just found it this morning.
Anyway, the reason I love thatand connect to it is because
I've said the same thing many,many times.
(18:35):
Because having kids, when I goto my kids' schools and I walk
through the hallways and I seeall the art projects, I freaking
come to life.
Yeah, and the reason I do isbecause to see purely, I mean in
its rawest, purest form, achild's imagination yes,
(18:57):
scribbling.
Because all adults, with nomatter what artist you name,
we're all thinking about whetherit's how to monetize this, how
to impress people, how to dothis, express oneself.
They're thinking about all thethings we're talking about.
They're thinking about socialmedia, what's going to get likes
, how are people going torespond?
(19:19):
But when you look at a child'sart, it's just so innocent and
many times way cooler than youknow a lot of adult art, and so
I sometimes I like want to buy apiece, like off the wall of a
children's school.
But then I'm like a creeperbecause I'm like this adult,
like you know, walking throughthe hallways of the school but I
(19:42):
literally can look atchildren's like the younger gosh
that sounds even worse.
But like the younger the child,the more innocent their art is,
like, even like a toddler justthrowing paint around, actually
a little older, like aroundkindergarten to like third grade
when they draw portraits,because I'm so fascinated with
(20:04):
portraits, but the way theycreate faces and it's just like
I'm like, yes, that's it, that'sit, that's what I want to see,
you know, uh.
But of course there'sgazillions of amazing adult
artists.
But I just love that bosco saidthat because I'm like man, I
relate to that.
There was a recent airportexhibit, a massive airport
(20:26):
exhibit of children's art, and Ijust spent like an hour just
staring at all these kids'paintings and drawings because I
just think it's so inspiring.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
You use the word pure , and I think that's about the
best way one could describe theart.
That comes from a child, and Ithink it's a product of not yet
being self-conscious, you knowFor sure.
And that's what.
I don't care what age you are.
It's funny you said there.
I was actually thinking in mymind.
I'm like I wonder about whenthat starts to sort of fade a
(20:58):
little bit, cause it does forsure.
I was talking to somebody theother day and and um and I'm
sure you get this a lot too youtalk to people who are are not
creatives will say things likeoh yeah, I don't have a creative
bone in my body, and it's likewell, you, you, you did at one
point you know, you probablystill Well, the other quote is
in there.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
Every child is born an artist.
The problem is how to remainone.
That's right Once we grow up.
You know from Picasso that'sjust it, right.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
It's like you know you'll never walk into the
classroom of kindergartners andfind somebody, find a kid who's
like I don't know how to, Idon't know how to draw.
It's like give me the crayons,give me the markers, let me, let
me get after it.
Yeah, and so so much of it.
I think, um, and I'm with you.
I think that the art that Ireally appreciate is something
where there's evidence of bothcontrol and spontaneity.
(21:49):
You know, in a way, thatspontaneity, though, is really
something that it's, it's, it's,it's, it's pure, because it's
in the moment, right.
It's pure because it's a productof, of play, without concern
for the product, you know,without concern for the result,
without concern for how it'sgoing to be received or, to your
point, you know how many likesit's going to get.
(22:10):
I, I really we've got kids aboutthe same age.
I really wonder, I really fearfor how the impact of you know,
things like social media impactor affect kids' creativity, and
there I can just imagine, I'mjust trying to project or
imagine what it would have beenlike had social media been
(22:32):
around when I was a kid, growingup and drawing or whatever you
know.
Would I have shared it?
Who knows?
But just the idea of, I mean Iremember vividly, like walking
upstairs after you know, drawinga picture of Kirby Puckett
knowing I didn't get the handright on his, you know and being
like I hope mom likes this.
I hope you know what I'm sayingand magnify that by, however
(22:57):
right, an audience of infinitepeople that could potentially
see something once you put itout into the world.
I really wonder, I fear for howmuch that would cause creatives
of all ages to sort of editwhat they're doing in real time
and hold back.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
I could go on and on about the impact of all that,
the comparison, but I'veactually never thought about it
from an art standpoint for kids,and I just think about about
all the other things, thegeneral comparison and the
toxicity of it all.
And I just read the other daythat, finally, schools are
(23:34):
starting to not allow phones atall in the school.
I'm like, finally, right, youknow it's gotta happen, right,
it's a whole different topic.
Um, yeah, I thought about beinga high school and being able to
being afraid to post your artbecause of fear of you know,
right, yeah, that's huge.
I wish there was like anInstagram account that only
(23:54):
posted like children's drawingsand paintings like we're talking
about.
It'd be sick.
Yeah, my most followed account,yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:02):
I love that.
The next quote that you've goton our list for today.
Well done, by the way, this isa powerful list.
Eleanor Roosevelt said smallminds discuss people.
Average minds discuss events,great minds discuss ideas.
Speaker 3 (24:19):
Love, love that quote Craziest story.
Years ago I was in a group witha bunch of guys and we would
meet every week and at one pointa buddy of mine said to me he
was like you know what coward,you only hang out with cool and
important people.
You're too good for us.
And for like two or three weeksI was like really convicted by
(24:42):
that.
I was like I do hang out with alot of cool or important or
famous people.
But I was like is it becausethey're cool or important or
famous?
And after like literally tonsof just dwelling on that, that
statement, I finally realizedsomething.
I was like it has nothing to dowith their cool factor, their
(25:04):
followers or whatever.
What I realized is that groupof guys that I was hanging out
with every time we hung out itwas I hate my job, I hate my
boss, Everybody sucks.
Life is terrible.
This is a dream.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:19):
And what I realized is that I'm drawn to dreamers,
creators, doers, thinkers,ideators, and it doesn't matter
if they're cool.
Like I thought about theliteral hundreds of hours I have
spent in this building meetingwith kids, meeting with
(25:40):
teenagers and college studentsand just people that want to
discuss ideas, want to get myfeedback, want to pick my brain,
all that stuff, and I love itbecause we're discussing ideas.
Those people aren't cool,they're not important or famous
or whatever, and I don't care ifit's the janitor in the
building.
I want to discuss how do wemake this world a better place?
(26:03):
How do we drink?
What are you working on?
What are you going to do withyour life?
What are you passionate about?
And so it just so happens thatpeople that are cool or
important or famous are doers.
They got there because theychase ideas and they chase
dreams.
And so that that quote byEleanor Roosevelt just hit home.
(26:24):
Because, like when I go to I'msure the same way with our kids
you go to like kids gatherings,athletic events, whatever you're
with as a parent and all theother dads are like talking
about again people or events.
It's like they're gossiping orthey're talking about I don't
know, stock market or politics,or last night's baseball game or
(26:47):
lebron james, which I love,sports too and I'm not saying we
can't talk about those things.
Uh, I certainly do talk aboutpeople and events.
But I just come to life whenI'm with you and or drew or
anybody else where we'rediscussing ideas.
Yeah, um, ideas meaning any ofthose topics you know, like,
(27:08):
what are we doing with the list?
Because being a creative of anykind is essentially like old
school being a hunter, like what, how are you going to provide
this month?
What are you doing?
What are you doing?
You know, we're not just havingthese boring nine to five jobs,
we're just we hate it and wewere just there to get a
paycheck, like.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
So it's fascinating to me to hang out and spend time
with literally any othercreative, whether they're cool
or not, I don't care, you know,yeah, so have you figured out a
way to skip through all of thesmall talk and BS and get to the
idea part with people thatmaybe don't go there, naturally?
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Yeah, I try to.
I mean, it's hard too, ascreatives, like not to talk
about ourselves because, like Iam so passionate about what I do
for a living, I could talkabout this stuff all day, and
I've learned that that's aturnoff to most people, because
they don't like their jobs, theydon't want to talk about work,
right?
So when I talk about my work,it can come across as cocky or
(28:13):
arrogant, because I'm talkingabout myself, and I've had to
like really reconcile thatbecause I don't think I'm an
arrogant person, I just lovewhat I do.
And so, um, yeah, I try to likeask questions like what, what
do you?
What are you passionate about?
If you don't like your job,well then what do you want to do
?
Well, I'd like to quit my jobone day and do this, and I'm
like, well, why don't you Like?
(28:35):
Time is ticking, life is short,like we just talked about.
You know, each of us have losta sibling and so, like man, life
is just way too short to notgive it a go and try to pursue
what you love.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
That's so true.
I think that reminds me ofsomething that I began to
understand just in the last fewyears here.
But I think that the moreyou're living in passion and
living with purpose, let's justsay to you know, throw some
cliches in the mix, but I thinkit naturally leads to less
patience for bullshit I thinkmost creatives have.
(29:15):
I won't speak for you, but I'mgoing to take an educated guess
and assume that I'm right aboutthis.
You, me, we have a thousandideas that are going to pop
through.
You know what I mean.
Just getting our coffees on theway over here, just seeing the
cracks in this beautifulbuilding and the floors, oh,
that's a beautiful, that's anice mark.
(29:36):
Let me capture it.
You know, there's alwayssomething, captain, that's
probably a product of the ADD,that I feel we may share as well
.
But I don't want to reserve anyspace in the finite amount of
time and whatever bandwidth thatI have to put towards BS or
(29:58):
things that don't lendthemselves to doing something,
making a contribution, makingsomething right, creating yeah,
yeah, it's just.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
yeah, it's way too short and even I mean, I have a
uh weird neurological diseasethat I'm fighting against and so
, yeah, I'm like facing my owndaunting physical challenges and
so I feel like even more I'vegot this race against time to
crank out stuff and do what Ilove, and so it's amazing how
(30:29):
much that impacts things forsure.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Can I ask you more specifically how that affects
the way you think about yourwork?
Speaker 3 (30:36):
Yeah, you know, it's funny, because this studio setup
thing that I did never wasbecause of my disease, because
my disease didn't really startgetting bad until the last year
or two.
But it's amazing how that justcollided, because now I just get
to stand behind a tripod andbasically stand still when I
(30:57):
shoot.
I don't have to be on locationand sitting up a million lights
and gear by myself.
See, it doesn't impact thingstoo much right now.
It would have our out, it wouldhave I was doing what you do.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
Sorry, you and ty you and ty both.
How you think about your work,though, how you approach what
you're doing on, yeah, whatevertimeline, or however you think
about that, I don't think myhealth stuff affects how I think
about it.
Speaker 3 (31:23):
Now I gotta just do what I got to do and figure it
out, right, yeah.
But I do watch even your videosand Ty's videos, like how
physical it is.
I mean, man, I love to do thatkind of work, but I don't think
I could.
My body could be bent over onmy knees all day, yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
Right, it's a lot.
The clock's ticking for all ofus.
Yeah, for sure, for sure.
The next quote you've got forus is um, from oscar wilde, and
this is an often shared quote.
Yeah, for a good reason.
Speaker 3 (31:58):
Be yourself, everyone else is taken yeah, I just, for
a million reasons, love thatquote.
It's kind of.
It's kind of similar to to thePicasso every child is born an
artist, like right now my13-year-old girl.
She's African-American fromHaiti and she wants to look like
(32:18):
a white girl and I'm liketrying to tell like when she has
a fro, it is truly the mostgorgeous thing ever.
Like she just looks.
Everybody agrees, like we allfreak out the rare moment she
has a fro.
And I was just telling her lastweek I'm like why do you want to
be like all the other people,like you're so gorgeous, so
(32:40):
unique, so special, and your froonly accentuates that, only,
like highlights that.
And I understand I mean, we allwent to middle school and there
is this you got to wear whateverybody else wear and do what
everybody else is doing.
But I'm trying to drill on themlike no, like be special, like
I was a weirdo and in highschool and I've always done
(33:03):
things differently and I feellike the older you get every
year, the more you're respected.
And not that it's about beingrespected, but still, society
responds to uniqueness, youngcreativity and um, yeah, man,
there's too much uh, uniformityout there, like everybody.
Like when I get in new yorkcity or anywhere.
(33:24):
That's not the South like.
Even around here everybodylooks the same, dresses the same
, and I just come to life when Igo to New York City and see
just this blend of humanity andeverybody doing their own unique
thing.
I just love it.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
Yeah, yeah, originality and the whole idea
of being yourself.
I mean, that's a lifelongpursuit.
I can't speak for you, but Ifeel as though I'm still.
I'm consistently amazed at howwho I am continues to evolve and
my understanding and connectionto what is our true self, yeah,
(34:01):
and that's something thatdoesn't just happen naturally.
I think that probably is aproduct, I suspect, of being
somewhat introspective andintentional.
I mean, as creatives, we tendto spend a lot of time in our
heads thinking about maybeourselves or maybe what we're
going to do with everythingthat's flowing through here.
But I just wonder what it wouldtake for the typical that
(34:26):
sounds so condescending to saythe average, typical person, you
know, not folks like us?
but that sounds so terrible tosay there's a better way of
framing that but just like howmore of us we, the collective,
we people could continue tospend time.
Because those are the people toyour other point.
Those are the people who aremost interesting to me, are the
(34:48):
ones who are continuing toconsider what am I doing here?
Like what's really the you know?
To your point about hey, you'vegot a dream, why aren't you,
you know, pursuing it?
You know, what are we doinghere?
Like what's the?
Where's this heading?
You know, as opposed to, well,this is the one way path that
(35:08):
I'm on, and keep it between youknow, 55 and 61 and you know,
off we go.
you know, I don't know what mypoint is.
I think I have one, but maybeit'll come out in a moment, but
I just there's tremendous value,I think, in being intentional.
Actually, I'll ask you do youhave, is there anything around
your habits, routines, anypractice that you have to spend
(35:30):
time, you know, with yourself,continuing to get to know you
know who you are today, asopposed to getting, maybe, stuck
in identity that you assumed atsome point in the past?
Speaker 3 (35:41):
Not necessarily a routine or practice.
Necessarily a routine orpractice, um, but I have
realized, over the last twoyears especially, that
obsessively learning is like theonly path forward.
Um, I think when you stoplearning, that is the fastest
path to burnout irrelevance,boredom, like so, like we're
(36:04):
taught that you go to school,you learn your craft and then
you go do your craft.
You stop learning, like godknows so many artists in all
genres, where they're I don'tknow how old you are, but I'm 47
in their 40s, especially 50s,they, they sell out under the
sunset, usually against theirwill, but they become irrelevant
(36:27):
, they become washed up, theirold style, old work, and I think
the only way to truly stay ontop of your game is to always be
a student.
And the NFT.
I should tell you a crazy story.
So two years ago, when the NFswere popping and that was the
thing I had this kid like keeppounding me.
(36:51):
I was down in art basel, miami,and this kid kept uh, dming me.
He's like, hey, let's gettogether and chat nfts.
And I was like, hey, no, I haveno injuries.
They intimidate me and I don'twant to.
You know I I was like nope, I'mout.
Actually, I tried it a littlebit, no success, and I just gave
(37:11):
up.
So I was like I really don'twant to.
And then he just kept pushingme.
So we get together and heexplains something called
generative code, which that'swhen it just exploded in my
brain.
In all these years of paintingand doing photoshop layers, I
(37:33):
instantly like just got it withwith generative code.
Generative code essentially isit's not ai.
A generative code is likehaving a studio system explore
all the combination of elements.
For you it's an invisiblestudio system.
And so I was like man, I couldcreate, and I literally created
(37:57):
nine, almost a thousandindividual pieces of art.
I've had our layers, canvas,polaroids, photoshop, ipad art,
layers, canvas, polaroids,photoshop, photographs, like all
this art.
And I threw it into what he hadtold me about generative code
and I created all this crazy artthat has never in the history
of the world been done before.
(38:18):
And I made a collection.
So I obsessively learned forlike three months how to do all
that release this collection.
When NFTs were a thing that intwo seconds made $700,000.
Literally Two seconds, wow.
We thought someone was wrong,we thought there was a technical
(38:40):
glitch, but it had sold outthat fast, wow.
But then the story keeps going.
So that opened up my nftjourney and then I just started
learning, learning, learningevery day, and then I finally
learned augmented reality, arand vr and I started playing
with all that stuff and anyway,I had a bunch more success with
nfts but my um diving into ar.
(39:05):
Then somebody was reminding mewe're starting a tech company
and they showed me what theywere doing with tech and I
brought all my knowledge of NFTsand AR to the table.
I was like y'all should reallybe doing AR.
And so they freaked out,brought me on as a partner, and
so now I'm a partner in thosetech company that is just
(39:28):
exploded and we're now workingwith the biggest artists on the
planet.
Uh, truly like I mean, we haveall the big country artists and
pop artists.
We now have nfl teams, majorleague baseball teams and nhl
hockey teams and I'm a partnerin this tech company.
And it's all because, rewindingto the moment in Florida when
(39:50):
this kid is like hey, you shouldreally learn this stuff, and
I'm like no, no, no, like mostpeople when they're older are
like no, that's for the kids,that's for the.
You know, tiktok is for justteenagers dancing, and look at
it now.
It's like everything everyone'son tiktok and reels and all the
things.
Um, it's a very long way ofsaying that that that all taught
(40:13):
me that.
Oh, I just learned the newthings and it changed my life
yeah because I'm obsessivelylearning and so now I'm like,
okay, moving forward, whateverit is, whatever it is, whatever
the next AI, ar, vr, nft,whatever the thing is, I'm going
to keep staying on the cusp ofthat before everybody else, so
(40:34):
that I can just keep figuring itout and not become bored.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
I love that story for a lot of reasons.
So, knowing your backstory andyour trajectory, you know a
little bit, you've dipped yourpen in a lot of creative ink.
You know you've done a lot ofdifferent things, and correct me
if I'm wrong, but I'm guessingyou could have, at any point at
different points along the way,sort of camped out and become
more static with, like, allright, I kind of got a groove
(40:59):
that would have paid the billsand taken care of things right
indefinitely.
So, to put that in the form ofa question, I'm curious do you
think it's a conscious choicethat you made at some point
along the way to say I'm goingto be somebody who continues to
evolve, or do you think that'sjust baked into your DNA?
It's?
Speaker 3 (41:15):
baked into being off the charts.
Atd, sure, yeah, and justgenerally curious.
I mean, I'm always shifting.
A lot of people do think that'spurposeful, but it's really not
.
It's just.
I think it's like actualextreme ADHD a lot of career
switching and there's a ton ofdownside to it.
(41:37):
We're talking about it rightnow as if it's this really cool,
sexy thing, but I couldprobably point out more
downsides to this than I couldpositives.
There's a lot of regret withsome of the things I've
abandoned, things that I shouldhave stuck with.
You know, could have supportedwhat I do now.
(41:58):
So, yes, it's awesome and it'sawful all at once.
Speaker 2 (42:00):
Right, right, yeah.
But to your point aboutlearning, though, too.
I think that's such animportant thing to realize is
that there's so much opportunityfor additional growth just
laying out in the world likelittle Easter eggs just all over
the place for us to just pickup.
And everything contributes toeverything.
(42:21):
Everything leads to the nextthing.
Right, everything contributes.
So you know things that you've.
I think about it a lot as aspicking up.
Well, for me it's picking upliteral tools and adding
additional physical tools thatare going to make different
marks and create differenteffects, you know, with my work.
But I also think about the ideaof adding figurative tools to
my sort of tool bag and notreally knowing how or when
(42:44):
they're going to reoccur, howthey're going to be useful again
, and then realizing I don'tknow if I've shared this in a
podcast before, but I had thisthis um, I don't know if you
remember this movie.
It was called uh, it was an Mnight Shyamalan, I can't say
this last name wrong.
That movie signs oh, yeah, okay.
So if you remember that there'sa scene that, as the film sort
(43:18):
of comes to an end, it's likethe last dramatic scene where
Joaquin Phoenix was a baseballplayer and his career, had he
got injured or something likethat, came to an end and that
was, I think, a big part of hissort of character arc was just
how he was depressed about notbeing able to pursue his dream
of playing baseball.
And the last scene culminateswhere they realize that and I'm
probably butchering this, butthis is how my memory is giving
it back to me at the moment butis that these aliens are, they
can only be, whatever killed ordealt with?
Water, yeah, yeah.
And that last scene wherethere's a glass of water and
(43:40):
Joaquin Phoenix grabs a bat andis able to because he knows how
to swing it swing away.
Merrill hits a glass of waterand is able to save, save his
family.
The point being, I don't knowwhy this sort of triggered
something for me, but the pointis that we never know what
little tools, skills, abilities,experiences, little nuggets of
knowledge that we've sort ofpicked up along the way are
(44:03):
going to be useful later.
Yeah, absolutely.
So.
That's kind of a mantra, youknow, for for me and other
people that I enjoy being indialogue with is just like
there's.
No, there's.
I've never read a book and, andbeen worse for it, I've never,
you know, had it, had it at anengaging conversation and not
(44:23):
you never.
But we just never know.
It's kind of the point and wedon't need to right.
You don't have to have a planwith what you're going to do
with something or oh, this isgoing to lead to right.
It's very rarely, if ever, alinear path A goes to, b goes to
.
We were talking aboutassembling Ikea furniture
earlier.
It's not.
Life ain't like that.
Exactly it's not.
(44:44):
If only life was just aassemble by number, you know, uh
, swedish made uh.
Speaker 3 (44:51):
But if you just open up your mind to just like I've
got to be curious, instead ofsaying no, that's not for me,
especially when it comes to thearts and creativity, like, open
up your mind, just try it, justdo it, just jump into the new
thing and give it a go and mostexperiences are so low stakes.
Speaker 2 (45:09):
What if you try something that doesn't work?
Yeah, exactly it's okay, you'reabout right back where you were
when you before you started.
Yeah, um, yeah, I love that.
So next quote I don't actuallyknow how to pronounce jessica's
last name, I don't know.
I don't know who this?
Is okay, yeah, do you happen toknow what she does, or her?
she's an illustrator illustratorokay fantastic, all right, so I
should probably know that.
Her quote the work you makewhile you're procrastinating on
(45:32):
your work is the work you shouldactually be making.
Yeah, I'm gonna read that againthe work you make while you're
procrastinating on your work isthe work you should actually be
making.
Yeah, talk to us about that.
Speaker 3 (45:43):
So good, yeah, I know jessica, um, she's so talented
but she nailed it.
I mean, like, if you're overhere just doing something out of
your pure passion on the side,uh, and just whether it's
doodles or art or wood making,like whatever you're doing like
that should be.
If that's what brings you joy,why not try to figure out how to
(46:06):
make that your actual thing?
And a lot of people would say,well then it removes the joy if
I'm monetizing it or trying to,which that could be true.
But I just can speak fromexperience.
Like I'm now 25 years into justchasing I don't doodle on the
side, like why I get to doodleprofessionally.
(46:27):
I get to just constantly shiftand try new things.
And, um, there's never been aday that I've dreaded, uh, a
monday, or I've never lookedforward to the weekends, like
this is where I want to be, whatI want to be doing.
And um, yeah, I mean if there'sanybody out there that's
listening and know they're doingthat little fun thing on the
(46:48):
side that they consider just alittle whatever, like maybe
that's the answer, but they'redoing that thing on the side and
saying I don't know what I'mgoing to do with my life.
I think she's saying that it'sright there.
Yeah, it's the thing you'redoing, yeah.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
And I think there's obviously a lot of details like
that thing might not be able tobe monetized, but I, of those
passions and some of thosecuriosities, if we're willing to
cross other things off the list, you know, I mean, if I'm, this
is true for me and I, I would,I would imagine probably most
people, if we did a, if you do atrue time audit, like a block
by block, like where's where'sthe time, you know, really going
, we all could find Where's thetime really going.
We all could find a couplehours here and there.
(47:47):
Oh, without a doubt, 15 minuteshere, right, without a doubt.
To do more of the thing thatreally stirs our soul, whether
we're fortunate enough, like youand I, to be able to do this
full time, or whether it's justcarving out a little.
It doesn't, I mean and that'simportant too Like it doesn't
have to become the thing thatpays all your be great if it did
(48:08):
.
But either whether it's justsomething you do on the side
that really just stirs your soul, or whether it's something that
becomes, you know, somethingbigger.
It starts in the same place andwhere it goes from there, you
know, really isn't up to usanyway.
For sure, yeah, for sure, Ilove it.
Tom York, heard of him.
(48:28):
What's your favorite, sorry,what's your greatest strengths?
And I actually I want to saythis so, um, so I listened to
your book in preparation for ouruh, for our, our conversation
today, and I just want to sharethis for our audience.
It's fantastic.
It's called I'm possible and um.
The audio version is read byyou, which I also really
appreciate because it's one ofmy most.
(48:49):
One of my biggest pet peeves iswhen authors don't read their
own words.
Speaker 1 (48:53):
Cause, even if there's a voice talent, that's
like better at talk.
Speaker 2 (48:56):
It's just not.
You know what I mean.
So you did a great job ofperforming and reading it as
well.
So I'm anyway, I'll just sharethis as a as an aside.
I was, um, when I was listeningto your book.
You opened with the story ofyour Tom York piece, which, if
you're not following Jeremy, youshould be, and so I'm listening
to this actually on a run.
I'm like man, I wish I couldsee this piece, and then you
(49:17):
reposted it on your Instagramand I was just like wow, that's
even better than you described.
That's awesome, so super, supercool.
So Tom said what's yourgreatest strength?
It's that I don't know what I'mdoing.
Speaker 3 (49:33):
Yeah, just again I found this morning when I was
kind of digging around, andthat's so Tom York to say.
But I just relate to that.
I think artists look at peopleyoung artists look at guys like
me and you and girls and theythink that we know what we're
doing.
And I really just don't.
(49:54):
I mean, I'm always going inquestioning myself.
There's always insecurity,there's always doubt, there's
always I suck.
I mean last year, goodnessgracious.
Last year was probably thehardest year I've ever had in
terms of self-doubt.
I mean, I was in the gutterlast year.
I was like everything I dosucks.
(50:15):
I don't know what I'm going todo for a living.
All my work is gone and if he'scrashed it's real bad and I
don't know what I'm doing.
And so, yeah, I just love thatout of anybody.
Tom York says that you know,and I just think it's a really
important thing for artists tohear, because I think Chuck
(50:37):
Close said, inspiration is foramateurs.
The rest of us just show up andget to work.
You know, like, even though Idon't know what I'm doing, I
just keep going.
That doesn't stop me.
Maybe that's the differencewith people like you and I it's
like, yeah, we don't know whatwe're doing.
And we do have the doubt andthe insecurity and all the
things, but literally every daywe just keep going 100%, keep
(51:00):
throwing stuff at the wall andseeing what sticks.
Speaker 2 (51:04):
In spite of those insecurities, doubts, fears,
yeah, neuroticism in all itsmany forms yeah, showing up the
next day to do something.
So you do know, you do know onething you're doing it's you're
showing up the next day to dosomething yeah I mean that's,
and I think that that'ssomething that is.
It's one of the most encouragingthings.
I don't remember when I when Ifirst sort of heard this or or
(51:28):
acknowledge this idea or thistruth that nobody really knows
what they're doing.
The only difference is thatsome people have become really
good at at convincing othersthat they do.
Speaker 3 (51:41):
That is for dang sure .
Speaker 2 (51:42):
Well, we're all making it up as we go.
You know and I think that's oneof the most encouraging things
that that anybody could everreally fully grasp is like oh
all the all, I pick, pick yourfavorite, whatever, the most
inspirational figures in anydomain.
They woke up every day and werelike, oh, we'll see how this
(52:04):
goes.
Yeah, right you know, and so ifone of the you know I mean, yeah
, tom York Radiohead would be onmy you know, certainly Mount
Rushmore of creative heroes andthe fact that this is going to
be funny because we talked aboutthis in an episode a couple
episodes ago but just the wholeidea of how often he they
(52:27):
reinvented themselves over timeTo us we might think, oh, they
were absolutely fearless andjust said we're just going to do
whatever we want.
But if we read into this quote,we could probably surmise that
with each album they're likewell, this is what we feel
called, this is what we feelpassionate about putting out
(52:52):
into the world.
And thankfully they hadobviously created some space for
some success to have a label belike all right, sure, I mean,
there's a little bit of caveatthere, but the point is
everybody has doubts and fearsand everyone's experiencing, no
matter where you're at in yourtrajectory and your career and
whatever thing you were tryingto progress in.
(53:12):
Yeah, it's normal, it's justpart of it.
Speaker 3 (53:15):
Yeah, exactly Just all the kids out there,
especially college students.
Yeah, just got to embrace itand that's part of the journey
you're signing up for.
Speaker 2 (53:26):
And continue to take action in spite of right,
because there's that whole, youknow, analysis or paralysis by
analysis, where we can try tojust continue to collect all the
information and try, and, youknow, chart a perfect course,
and it's like good luck, youknow.
I mean, all I know is that I'mgoing to take a left from here
and then we'll see what the next, where the next intersection
(53:46):
brings me.
You know what color the lightis, you know.
Next quote the best thing abouta picture is that it never
changes, even when the people init do.
The best thing about a pictureis that it never changes Even
when the people in it do.
You take first crack at that,cause I love it Again.
Speaker 3 (54:09):
I just I've got a lot more quotes and I mentioned
some of them today that thatit's not like these are my
favorite quotes of all time,like that one I literally found
today.
But that one hit me Causethat's what I do, is I take
pictures of people every singleday.
Sometimes I think.
I think my record is about 165shoots in one day, literally 165
portrait sessions.
(54:30):
Um, wow, and I might have toput that quote somewhere here in
the studio, because a portraitreally is this chapter marker,
like if your life is a wholebook, like we all love pictures
and books to break up the textand to stop and look at
something yeah like if your lifeis a book and it's going to
(54:51):
have a few portraits scatteredthroughout, like a portrait just
captures that, that chapter,whether it's a divorce,
depression, the best day ever,like whatever it is it captures
that and the story keepsevolving.
And I just love that quotebecause that is what I'm doing.
The picture is there forever,but your life, your story, is
(55:14):
going to keep changing, couldeven change the day after that
picture happened.
But I love just that briefsecond of time that you're
forever frozen in this portrait,which is why I do what I do.
Speaker 2 (55:27):
It's interesting because I think forgive me, I'm
blanking on the name of theproject that you started in
taking portraits, the.
Speaker 3 (55:36):
Help Portrait yeah.
Speaker 2 (55:38):
Can you talk about that a little bit, and I've got
a follow-up question to that.
I think it's a beautifulproject, thank, you.
Speaker 3 (55:44):
He has a real simple idea before social media uh, to
take pictures of people in needand print them and give them
away.
That was it.
That was the end of the agenda.
No portfolio, no use, no selfrewards for the photographers,
just take pictures, give themaway.
Um, so we did it once in 2007,and then we used blogs at the
(56:09):
time to spread the word, and thenext year it was in 45
countries and then it became aglobal movement and we've taken
over a million portraits sincethen and like 80, 90 countries,
and so, um, I find thateverybody wants to help, but a
lot of times people don't knowhow to help and they don't
(56:30):
necessarily want to help in waysthat are not gifted or skilled
at.
Like, it's not everybody'sthing to go serve food at the
mission or to go clean awarehouse or whatever the thing
may be, but if you tellphotographers, use your camera
and go to this thing andphotograph people, it's just
crazy what happened.
It was a very simple idea thatI chased um.
Speaker 2 (56:54):
That turned into this literal worldwide movement the
power of portrait, though I'dactually like to.
I've thought a lot about the.
Speaker 3 (57:03):
I mean so yeah, so I'm sorry, I kind of missed the
question.
Let me speak into that.
So, yeah, we've.
We have literally seen peoplewalking the streets a year and
two years later, still holdingthe framed portrait that they
got.
Um, there's this old, old storyfrom like the 1800s about a war,
uh, where people walking aroundnaked they had nothing.
(57:26):
Uh, where people walking aroundnaked, they had nothing.
There was no food, no water, no, anything, but somebody shipped
a massive um cart of redlipstick and so all these women
were walking around town.
They had nothing.
You know, there is the middleof war.
They were hungry, they weretired, but this red lipstick
(57:49):
gave them this massive sense ofbeauty, dignify, like I feel
good, I at least have my redlipstick.
And the same kind of holds trueof what we do with Help
Portrait, like we're stillgiving them that.
They walk around being ignored,being spat spat on, being just
looked down upon by society.
(58:09):
So, for a brief moment, to givethem this here here's who you
really are, with your hair,makeup done in your shower.
We're giving you new clothes.
We're giving you all this newstuff, giving you professional
lighting and showing you who youreally are, like that this is
your full self and so for themto hold on to that and be able
(58:30):
to go get a job with it, whichwe've had done send it to their
loved ones.
They haven't seen in decades.
We've seen that Like.
It's so powerful.
I mean hundreds and hundreds ofstories that I could share from
13 years of doing this.
Speaker 2 (58:49):
It's crazy the power of just one image, though.
Yeah, it's a, it's a, it's alittle time capsule.
For sure, we, we we talkedabout this a little bit before
we started rolling too but Ithink, especially when you think
about, you know, grief, loss,the things that are left behind
when the person you know nolonger is yeah, that's your, no
longer is, yeah, that's yourbrother's shirt, yeah, like
(59:10):
that's.
That's a.
There's something to thatlittle like this is this is.
This moment will never happen.
You know, you take a photo likethat, that's it.
That's, that's frozen in time,that's never gonna.
You couldn't replicate it evena second later, at least not
exactly you know and I thinkthere's just something about
having those little things tohave a connection to.
(59:31):
It's one of the things that Ilove about your work photography
, you know, in general, just theability to document an
experience, a time and an energy.
I mean that's something, too,you know.
I think that the art ofphotography is capturing, you
know, someone's energy, theirmood, and the fact that you put
(59:52):
as much of your heart and soul,maybe even more, into those
portraits of the homeless thatyou do into the famous people
that millions of people aregoing to see on the cover of
magazines and album covers Likethat's just really beautiful.
Speaker 3 (01:00:10):
Well, thank you, yeah , yeah, it's been an amazing
thing to be a part of.
Yeah, for sure it's neat.
Speaker 2 (01:00:16):
Let's talk.
Let's close with this.
This is something that youbrought to the table and I, I'm,
I'm, I'm interested in wherethis goes.
But what's an artist, jeremy?
Speaker 3 (01:00:25):
I don't know why, but for some reason I've thought
way too much about this questionwhat is an artist?
And a few years ago I finallycame up with what I think is
just like the right way to framewhat an artist is.
I think an artist is somebodythat if they were the only
person left on Earth with thatwill smith movie where he was
(01:00:49):
the only guy on earth I forgetwhat it's called um jew's not a
little left to remember that Iwant to say I am robot, but
that's not it.
Speaker 2 (01:00:57):
That's what I wanted to say it's not a robot no, it's
something else.
Speaker 3 (01:01:00):
Anyway, if you're the only person on earth yeah,
there's no one to see your work,there's no one to like your
post, there's just no audiencewould you keep creating?
If the answer is yes, I thinkyou're an artist.
Yeah, like, in other words, youhave to do it.
Yeah, it's a form of breathing.
It doesn't matter what you'recreating.
If you have to create tosurvive, I think that I think
(01:01:25):
that's an artist.
Audience or no audience, that'swho artists are.
Speaker 2 (01:01:30):
I agree with that, and I think that the term artist
can be extended to reallyanything that involves a version
of self-expression.
People, whether they're awareof it or not, it doesn't really
matter, quite frankly, whetherit is a conscious thing that
registers or not, there isexpression.
To that.
There is something to be saidfor there's there's a, there's a
(01:01:51):
, there's a personal I.
I'm putting a little piece ofme into this thing that I'm
doing because I love doing it,because I would do it, whether
anybody else was there to see itor go about it regardless.
Yeah, agreed, that feels like agood place to end.
Yeah, man.
Yeah, thank you so much for thetime, of course, great to meet
you and for everybody listening,definitely go check out
(01:02:13):
Jeremy's work.
Where can people find you?
Speaker 3 (01:02:16):
At Jeremy Cowart on Instagram and all socials on
jeremycowartcom.
Speaker 2 (01:02:22):
Amazing.
Thank you, brother.
Thanks man Appreciate it.
Yep, thanks man Appreciate it.
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