If you know anything about me, you probably know that I’m generally flippant about photography and about what I do.

But, in spite of that, I actually do take it very seriously. I never want to be in a rut, or just shoot the same stuff in the same way, or take any of it for granted. Toward the end of last year, I had some conversations with one of my good photography friends. During one of those talks, he gave me the word “purposeful” when I was struggling to describe some changes I wanted to make in my photographic journey/process. That was exactly the word: I wrote it down on a card that lives on my studio desk.

That led me to take a workshop last month in Maine. A small group of photographers spent two and a half days shooting inside of one building. (One unheated building. In Maine. In March. When it snowed.) But in addition to making images of the place, we spent time reflecting on the building, the space, the unseen history that got there before we did, on how we felt being there, on words we’d use to describe out initial emotions about the place.

The first day it seemed that we were going to be there way too long, that it was going to be impossible to fill our time with the things we were tasked with…

South Solon Meetinghouse
Solon, Maine
photographed 3.19.2026