We were just two small town kids with big city lights in our eyes while attending the School of Visual Arts in New York aspiring to be proficient but otherwise mundane fashion photographers. We were used to receiving positive critique but then an instructor told us something like, “You know, this is fantastic work guys, but do you know how many people are already doing something similar professionally and already doing it better?” In a shock, that was when our isolated worldview came crashing down and that’s when we made a purposed choice to alter our course.

GREAT, BUT OTHERS DO IT BETTER

So we set out to forge our own niche instead of simply reacting to what was already going on. Initially we found ourselves rejecting everything that we had been associated with at some professional cost in an attempt to stake out some sort of “new” territory. This made it harder on us because we were foregoing some surefire means of financial survival but creatively we found ourselves garnering a surprising bit of attention. The instructor was right! The first work that we did that was a dramatic departure from the expected “fashion” was a series of images called “TOMA”. The contrived poses, plain backdrop, and fiercely ambiguous expressions were replaced with moon landings, leaps over lions, and Where’s Waldo craziness. We went over the top but it got us more attention then we’d ever had before and all because it wasn’t the expected.

Being called out like that in the classroom not because our work was bad but because it was the same hurt. But, it was more of a call to action than something to go and cry about. It was a call to stop trying to fit ourselves into a hole that we really weren’t meant for and it was a call to return to the less safe work that we had first been doing while students at The Art Institute of Pittsburgh. We castrated ourselves creatively to fulfill preconceived expectations of New York and the industry. “Great, but others do it better”. We were allowed to be ourselves and have fun again and that’s why it was the best advice ever.