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Living Independently After Maria

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 15.3% of Puerto Rico residents under 65 have a disability, a rate higher than anywhere on the mainland. About a third of those people, it reports, have trouble with basic tasks like bathing and dressing. And Puerto Rico’s disabled population was especially vulnerable to the havoc wrought by Hurricane…

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Photo Essay: LGBTattoo

LGBTattoo: Connecting to community and identity through body art I did this semester-long project for Gary Knight’s class Advanced Documentary Practice, the second half of PNDP, during my last spring at Tufts. You can see it as a magazine layout in PDF format (with screen-reader accessible text) here, or read the entire essay below. Tattooing…

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PNDP Final Project: Hair

The end of Program for Narrative and Documentary Practice last semester culminated in a multi-week project about a subject of our choice. I chose hair, and started calling at barber shops and salons to see if they’d let me take pictures there. I learned a lot about hair, met a lot of cool hair stylists,…

PNDP: Lynn

Here’s the second part of the abandoned first draft of my PNDP final project. I was going to look at economic inequality by comparing Manchester-by-the-Sea, the wealthiest town in the North Shore, to Lynn, the poorest. That didn’t work out, but I wound up with some nice landscapes. Click the thumbnails for a better view….

PNDP: Manchester-by-the-Sea

Here’s part of the abandoned first draft of my PNDP final project. I was going to look at economic inequality by comparing Manchester-by-the-Sea, the wealthiest town in the North Shore, to Lynn, the poorest. That didn’t work out, but I wound up with some nice landscapes. Click the thumbnails for a better view. More PNDP…

PNDP: Forest & Road

Here’s PNDP assignment #8: to shoot 6 pictures of highways and 6 pictures of the woods. I chose to do graphically matched pairs of photos to compare the two settings. Some of the parallels are obvious; others, less so. I’d love to hear what you think about it. For this assignment, I wanted to draw…

PNDP: Animals

Here’s PNDP assignment #7: to capture animals and their relationship to the humans around them. Some pets are less popular than others. Most people are fine with having a cat or a dog, but would balk at the idea of sharing their space with a snake, lizard, or tarantula. I wanted to find out who…

PNDP – Sports II

Here’s PNDP assignment #6: go to another game by the same team as the previous assignment, and shoot away from the action. The writing assignment was a poem made out of conversations overheard at the game. Number 4! Mohammed, come back You can’t let him get there On the ground There’s still so much I…

PNDP – Sports

Here’s PNDP assignment #5: to go to a Wonderland youth sports game and try to tell the story of it through photos. Also, to write a poem about it. I chose the Medford High School JV soccer team, photographed a game in disgusting rain, and wrote a poem inspired by this video. Even though The…

PNDP – Portraits on Revere Beach

Here’s PNDP assignment #4: more portraits of strangers, but this time thinking about the concept of theophany (deities appearing to mortals in human form) while we were shooting. I went out to Revere Beach for this assignment. People were not as friendly out there as they were in Medford Square, except for Paul. Paul says…