Kharim Hogan

Photography has been a life giving adventure for me since I was a child.  Photography has been my inspiration, one of my vehicles for self-expression, my peace, my refuge, my passion, my living and my way.  As long as I’ve been involved in photography, I have consistently found within it new challenges, more to learn, a sense of peace and a reason to go out and further explore my world and the people in it.  A reason to keep challenging myself.

My passion has always been people and the stories they tell, and I have used photography as a way to know more about you and about myself.  There have been times when I’ve stopped photographing completely.  And though I took no photographs during those times, this also taught me more about who I am.  Without the camera I get stuck, or perhaps it is that I get stuck and then stop photographing.  With the camera I am challenged to see differently and when I am willing to look for it, I see so very many things from which I can learn, become more and move forward.  Some of the things I see, I absolutely love, while others are more difficult for me to swallow.  Either way, when I’m willing to stop and look, I inevitably learn something more. 

I need my camera and I love the stories it reveals for me.  At times what I see in my photography scares me, other times it thrills me, again it moves me and ultimately, when I am ready to see it, it changes me.  I have always found it magical to grab an instant in time. 

Life, for me, is like a running movie and we anticipate what’s coming next.  But I have found that when I capture but a moment of it and then look back at what I captured, suddenly the story can be interpreted in so many different ways.  I can rewrite the script completely…and I find that really fun!!

It excites me to see, through the photographs I take, how many different variations of any given movie I can come up with.  I have always loved telling stories and I get excited when others tell their stories, whether it be directly or through the photographs I take.  My camera is like my GPS and has become for me a way to navigate the world and to reach into my soul, and I love it!

Kharim