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Quote by Jeff Vespa

“But when I was a kid, I would look at the paper next to the phone and I would think to myself, "I want to do that." So I started doing that. [doodling]”

Quote by Jeff Vespa

Author

Jeff Vespa, born on January 17, 1970, is a renowned photographer known for his work capturing street culture and celebrity portraits. His images are celebrated for their ability to convey emotion and story. more

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“Over the years, she [my mother] always encouraged me in the arts. She actually worked at an art museum when we were kids. I took classes there. She was the one that, when we'd go to the store and I would have a pack of eight pastels, she'd say, "No, get the 24-pack." She was always encouraging me to get the best materials, which was really awesome.”

Years Art Kids Mother Class Materials Eight Stores Museums Packs Pastel Really Awesome

Author:Jeff Vespa

“There were just moments of the punk scene and I realized that I had to capture it. There was also this photographer in our preschool - I went to a Montessori school in Baltimore, Maryland - and they had this photographer come and take all these incredible photographs. They looked like they were from Life magazine.”

Moments School Scene Photographer Incredibles Photograph I Realized Magazines Capture Punk Baltimore Montessori Preschool Maryland

Author:Jeff Vespa

“We were little children, four or five years old, but they were all around the house and they made us look epic, like we were part of some story being told. My mom would have this woman come to our house and take photos of us. She did a photo book of us as well when I was one. I still have it.”

Years Wells Looks Children Littles Made Stills Book Stories House Five Four Mom My Mom Five Years Epic Five Year Olds

Author:Jeff Vespa

“Learning that aesthetic as a kid - seeing those photos - made me think that that's what photos are supposed to look like. I never understood snapshots. I was looking at them like, "This is horrible; that's not what a picture is supposed to look like." I was taught by these photos. So when I picked up the camera, though I had never done it before, I kind of already knew what I was doing.”

Thinking Looks Kind Made Done Kids Seeing Taught Understood Cameras Horrible Aesthetic Snapshots

Author:Jeff Vespa

“My mom had bought this camera to take classes herself and I remember working with her on it, understanding how the stop-motion [worked], having a high shutter speed and things like that. Long before I picked it up myself, I remember being on a slide at a country club going into the water and wanting my mother to put in on a high shutter speed so she could catch me on the slide without it being blurred. I remember having fun with her: "Let me go on the slide and you'll catch me in motion!" Those are some of the little moments in my artistic making.”

“The Canon AE1 - a fully manual camera. [My mother] had a 50mm, which is a standard lens, and then I got a 28mm. Then I started a little punk magazine, a zine, when I was 14 or 15 years old. I was shooting my friends skateboarding and it was the beginning of the Macintosh. We wouldn't do layouts on the computer; we would pick the font and then type up a paragraph and then print it out and cut it up and put it in a little mock-up and Xerox it.”

Years Littles Mother Cutting Type Computer Standards Picks My Friends Cameras Magazines Shooting Print Punk Lenses Mock Paragraph Manuals Canon Skateboarding Macintosh Layout Fonts Xerox Zines

Author:Jeff Vespa

“I never went to school for that. In high school we had photography, which was great. That was another moment of discovery. I had a great teacher - I can't even remember her name now. I ended up going to boarding school for my last high school years and they had a dark room there. Of course there was curfew; you were supposed to be in bed at a certain time. But I would sneak out and sneak into the dark room and work all night.”

“My teacher introduced me to this photographer Eugène Atget. He was a French photographer in the late 1800s up until 1927 in Paris. He didn't consider himself an artist, but he was probably one of the artists of the 20th century. This guy documented all of Paris during those years. It's unbelievable. The books are phenomenal. The Museum of Modern Art has all his stuff now and [American photographer] Berenice Abbott saved his work. Not very much is known about his life, but the work is unreal and it totally spoke to me. He was the only artist for a number of years that I cared about at all.”

Years Art Book Artist Guy Stuff Numbers Known Teacher Modern Century Late Photographer Saved Paris Spokes Museums 20th Century Unbelievable This Guy Unreal Phenomenal Modern Art

Author:Jeff Vespa

“I was doing a lot of web design at the time. And anybody that has an agent thinks, "Why do I need an agent?" Maybe it's a little different as an actor - of course you need an agent - but any kind of agency that's selling something for you, you think, "Why can't I sell this myself? It doesn't make sense."”

Thinking Needs Kind Littles Different Courses Actors Design Sells Selling Agents Make Sense Agency Web Design Selling Something

Author:Jeff Vespa

“A lot of people have done that over the years. Many of the agencies today were started by photographers. It's a normal progression. It wasn't some crazy idea, it was just, "Can we start our own agency? Can we do this?"”

People Years Ideas Done Today Crazy Normal Photographer Agency Progression Crazy Ideas

Author:Jeff Vespa