I have always wanted to do an exhaustive conceptual shoot, where everything from the art direction, props, and costumes, to lighting and scene setup, and the subject’s postural and facial gesture synchronously coming together in service of a specific idea. In short, a thorough engaging exercise of the mind in its pre-planning to an exhaustive end-execution confined to an assigned trajectory. I often shoot street, events, and commercials, yet a project such as this had been scarce to none. I pondered before of the complications of distilling the thought processes of filmmaking to be integrated into a portrait shoot. Will it be harder, due to the limitation of singular frames within a series? I can’t tell you now which is harder, but I can tell you that this approach does have its own set of challenges and rewards. This is thoroughly more fun and engaging for me, perhaps due to its closed, personal and rather unbounded freedom of creative direction as opposed to a film’s more delicate diplomacy between multiple creative heads.

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As for this idea of the ‘Eccedentesiast’, it is a combination of Latin words that ultimately translates as ‘presenting a performer who shows teeth’. 2018 was a year of reckoning for me, where I had long nights in cold bathrooms in deep contemplation, and the resulting ‘me’ today amidst the chaos is in many ways reflective of an eccedentesiast - though to a much, lesser, degree.