Chef Joe Johnson // A Portrait
Last night, I happened upon an event in Manhattan and was able to pull aside Chef Joe 'JJ' Johnson of The Cecil aside for a portrait. I had about 2 minutes of his time and an empty office with a window to work with...and I just love how this turned out. Sometimes, it is that simple.
Best New Chef // Food & Wine Magazine
in Editorial
The July issue of Food & Wine just hit the news stands and I am THRILLED to be a part of not one - but two! - features in this issue! The first is the exciting news of Chef Jim Christiansen being named one of the Best New Chefs of 2015! Jim is one of 10 amazing chefs from around the country to receive this honor and I couldn't be happier from him! I've had the pleasure of photographing Jim + the entire crew at his restaurant Heyday over the years and it has been so cool to see all of their growth and also how much of a team effort they all give!
For this story, we photographed the "Trend Setting Dishes" and I just love how it all turned out! Of course, we pulled this off with our own amazing crew - a big thank you to Liz Gardner for food styling and to Melissa Hesse for assisting this day! Food & Wine has been on my dream list for a long time and I am incredibly proud to begin this relationship with them! Make sure to check out the full July issue of Food & Wine to check out the full spread + see who all the Best New Chefs are! We'll be sharing more images from this shoot later this summer, but in the mean time, here are some behind-the-scene photos, too!
New York Magazine's Grub Street
Two dishes from the über talented chefs of Spoon and Stable and Heyday were featured on New York Magazine's food blog, Grub Street! These images were a part of a feature about "103 of the Most Visually Exciting Dishes in America". So happy to be a part of this!
FARMERS MARKET // TEST SHOOT
Because some mornings you wake up and you just HAVE to make something. A quick trip to the farmers market was in order - and I was on a mission to find the prettiest colors and shapes that I could for the day. These are all so simple, but I'm pretty happy to have created today.
Food + Color // Test Shoot
in Editorial
I have always believed in test shoots. They are a way to collaborate and try our ideas, new ways of shooting and if we're lucky, a little portfolio building. I've been shooting a lot of food the last couple of years and they are some of my favorite assignments. I seem to connect with food and the culture around it so naturally, but I wanted to create a little something out of the box and new. I've had the idea of mono-chromatic food in my head for a while now. Like, what if we made food poster art? What if we photographed food in a modern, minimalist, graphic way?
I gathered some of my most talented friends and colleagues, Chef Jon Wipfli of The Minnesota Spoon, Creative Director Liz Gardner and my Editor Liz Hardt to join me and we simply had an afternoon of creating. It was fun, it was chill and I love the way these images turned out! Everyone gave their time and talents to this idea, and I am very grateful for that! Personally, test shoots like this fuel my creativity and make my work stronger and I think shoots like this are so necessary as artists. Check out the little series of Food + Color below, along with the behind-the-scene photos!
BEHIND THE SCENES //
Welcome to the new site!
Welcome to the new site! It always feels like a huge accomplishment to update and refresh our online presence, but as we all know, this is usually one of those projects that sits on the back burner for a long time. Seeing all of the updated work together makes me so, so proud.
We've been hustling. Like, for real, in the last few years, I have taken on a lot of new clients and expanded our editorial portfolio *quite* a bit. I feel like I've been working at an insane pace and I have to take a moment to say THANK YOU to my team. From our interns to our assistants to our production team - I truly can not thank you enough. You all know who you are and you support me on a daily basis to create the best work possible. For all of the Art Directors, Editors, Project Managers and Producers that we have worked with - thank you for pushing us creatively and hiring us for these opportunities. I also need to specifically thank Loop, Liz, Josef, Sara, Shawn and Conor for all of the critique and technical help I needed to put this together.
As I began editing down this new body of images I realized that in many ways there is a whole new shift to the work that we are embarking on and we are also hitting our stride a bit. While still focusing on portraiture and lifestyle images we have begun to incorporate more food and location photography as well. It's all so exciting and I can't wait to see where we continue to go.
I hope you enjoy the new look and the new work!
NEAL Jewelry Lookbook + Launch
in Fashion, Commercial, Editorial
I was happy to photograph the new look book for NEAL Jewelry's latest collection, NOVA. The brand, formally known as Carrier Pigeon, just relaunched as NEAL Jewelry and with this, came a whole new look. Liz Gardner of Bodega, ltd. had a huge part in both the concept and styling of this shoot, where much of the inspiration came from the new colors of NEAL + the 90's. Mom jeans, Linda Evangelista, all of it. Heather Byington was our talent and Romeny Chan lent her talents for all of the hair + makeup. Below are some of my favorite images from the shoot, along with some behind the scene photos.
BEHIND THE SCENES
MSP Style Makers // September 2014
The month of September brings a new issue of MSP Magazine to the newsstands and I have been SO excited to share this for quite some time. I was asked to photograph the cover + feature story for the magazine and this turned out to be one of my most favorite projects of the year. In the magazine world, the 'September' issue is always usually centered around fashion and style. MSP chose to highlight real people, who influence the style in Minneapolis, for their issue this year. I must say - this was one room packed with powerful, successful and very creative individuals. Minneapolis always seems to constantly provide a city full of talent and I always feel so lucky that my job allows me to cross paths with many of these people. I often leave feeling very inspired. As for my crew, we pulled together our dream-team to make this happen! Special thanks to Flashlight Photo Rental, Romeny Chan and her crew for hair & makeup, Liz Gardner of MSP for art direction, design and styling, Liz Hardt for post production and Ali Kaplan of MSP for writing the article. This issue is special, because the cover is not one - but two pages! It's a gatefold cover that highlights all of the talented people in the feature. As for the individual portraits inside the magazine, we wanted to show every person's style, so we asked them to come along with their own belongings to be styled. My job was then to capture everyone's personalities - in one frame. Below are the spreads that are published in the issue, along with some of the behind-the-scene photos from our shoot! (Special thanks to our interns, Hanna and Melissa for these!) Here's a list of our Style Makers for this article, they are people you will surely want to follow:
Lisa Castro // Director of Design for Target
Keith Dorsett // Manager at Heimie's Haberdashery
Dahlia Brue // Owner of IDUN
Devin O'Brien // Co-founder of Search and State Clothing
Courtney Vincent // Associate Creative Director at Peterson Milla Hooks
Madelynn Furlong // Blogger of Wide Eyed Legless
Charley Brackney // Creative Director and Co-Founder of HAUS Salon
Lane Weinberg // Co-Founder and Designer of Kokoon clothing
Jim Smart // Owner of Smart Associates design firm
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Best Pizza in Minneapolis // MSP Magazine // August 2014
in Editorial
Before this month of August slips past us, I have to share two features that we were a part of in Minneapolis / St Paul Magazine! First, we added another cover to our roster, and I absolutely love how it turned out! August was all about the best pizza in Minneapolis and the surrounding areas. The cover pizza is from Red Wagon Pizza and I love how the beets and arugula popped out to readers and passersby on the newsstand - and props to MSP Design Director, Liz Gardner, on the great design. I think the guys at Red Wagon thought I was a little crazy, when I was moving the pizzas all around to find a great space to shoot them on. Turns out, an asphalt driveway was the winner! I've been photographing a lot of food this past year and I have really, really enjoyed it. Above all, I am able to immerse myself in the local food culture of Minneapolis, which is one of my favorite aspects of this city. This feature took me to Pig Ate my Pizza, Pizzeria Pezzo, Cossettas, Hello Pizza, Randy's Pizza, Two Pony's Pizza Farm and Red Wagon Pizza. I met so many great people, who are passionate about creating the best experience ever for their guests and I am so happy with how this turned out! The second feature in the August issue that we worked on is all about Social Media! You can read all about that here!
