Ohh it’s my birthday, woot woot woot. I had this idea that I was going to post the top 31 things I love about photography, but my head got confused and too peppy after my grande toffee latte and I sort of just found a vaguely chronological visual remembrance of my years in photography.

And it turned out to sort of mirror the dark dreamy stuff I’ve been posting lately, so I went with it. So here we go!

1. Joseph Sywenkyj

I had a very lucky early brush with greatness by ending up in high school with this man. We shared the photography prize junior year, and he’s gone on to phenomenal things. I couldn’t be prouder.

Odessa, Ukraine, 2004

2. Henry Horenstein. Wrote my first textbook on photography– Beyond Basic Photography. I remember squinting at it in the college library, trying to understand over and under exposure. I met the fellow in person last year and he was lovely. Also he knows how to shoot a newt.

3. Sally Mann. I know, so predictable, but she gave a great artist lecture during photo II at RISD, and there’s just nothing like Immediate Family.

Emmett Darling, 1993

4. Taryn Simon. She was the star photo pupil in college, a few years older. Seemingly perfect, and impossible to hate because her work was (and is) so good. I love The Innocents.

WILLIAM GREGORY Wick's Parlor, Louisville, Kentucky With fiancée Vicki Kidwell, whom he dated prior to conviction Gregory was pool champion in prison Served 7 years of a 70-year sentence for Rape and Burglary, 2002

5. Dorothea Lange. I gave my first slide lecture on Ms. Lange. I’d never heard of her, the FSA, or anything, really, it seems now. Still I have a soft spot for here, especially some of her lesser known work. I like this one. Spooky.

Also you can download her images from the Library of Congress, so she can be like your own private artist.

Funeral Cortege, End of an Era in a Small Valley Town, 1936

6. Richard Misrach. This work got me on a big, big sky kick when I moved to NYC. It took me a while to stop shooting horizons in New Jersey as a result.

Golden Gate Bridge, 2.5.00, 7:17am

7. Elger Esser. Saw his work at Sonnabend years back. Loved loved the washed-out skies.

8. Oh, Jeff. You blew my mind, right from the beginning.

Fieldwork. Excavation of the floor of a dwelling in a former Sto:lo nation village, Greenwood Island, Hope, B. C., August, 2003. Anthony Graesch, Dept. of Anthropology, University of California at Los Angeles, working with Riley Lewis of the Sto:lo band 2003

9.  I went to grad school in New York and started meeting tons of photographers. Ofer Wolberger was in the Bronx Museum of the Arts AIM Fellowship program with me and wowed the socks off us all.

Red River, Houston, TX, 2001

10. Ben Donaldson. Ben and Lisa Kereszi taught at ICP when I worked there, and I sorta wanted to be them. Ben’s work just gets better and better.

Bible and Painting, Dover, MA, 2004

11. Barry Stone. Remarkably prolific, and a fellow graduate of ICP’s administration office, Barry is now teaching and creating in Austin, TX. I love following his weekly picture archive.

from The Fifth of July

12. Lots of great folks kicked around ICP’s halls. Off the top Jessica Dimmock, Christopher Lamarca, Stephanie Keith, Priyanka Dasgupta, Cory Treadway, Willie Davis, Capucine Bailly, Arantxa Cedillo, Paul Fittipaldi, Neil Harris, Julie Kubal, Lauren Lancaster, RJ Mickelson, Kelly Shimoda, Willy Somma, Hannah Whitaker, Matt Porter, Joshua Lutz, Marni Horwitz, Marla Caplan, Charles Atherton, Catherine Kunkemueller, Stacy Arezou Mehrfar, Abigail Simon… it’s dizzying, there are too many, it’s an embarrassment of riches.

Willie Davis

13. Andrea Modica. The first favorite of many photo books to come, Treadwell. Holy wow:

** here is where this post is making me a little exhausted so i am going to be a little faster, a little looser. you understand. it’s my old age talking.

14. Ok! Halfway through on our journey here! I left ICP to go to Nerve.com and photo edit. Sexier times, but some top notch photography.

Todd Hido

15. Timothy Archibald

16. I fell in love with Mr. Bill Henson and his opera.

17. And David Hilliard.

18. I work ed with amazing photographers who wrote blogs for Nerve. 1: Mr. Clayton Cubitt:

19. 2: Mr. Ryan Pfluger:

20. 3: Kate and Camilla

21. I went to work at Rolling Stone Online. New kind of photography. Mostly wire shots of Xtina, but I soaked up some Peter Yang too. also I love Vonnegut.

22. On to blogging at PhotoShelter. Got really into animal photography. Interviewed the gracious and cool Tim Flach.

23. Met some great photo assistants, including the amazing Thomas Prior, and his amazing blog.

24. I looked at loads of photography. There were some Chilean thunder storms, shot by Carlos Gutierrez of UPI/Landov.

25. I learned about some amazing projects, notably Eric Ethridge’s Breach of Peace.

26. I was thoroughly amused by other bloggers, notably Andrew Hetherington.

from Made in Ireland

27. I was often wowed by photographers who popped onto my radar, out of nowhere, and then became a daily read- like Dalton Rooney. And his print of the month.

Sicily (2008)

28. I revisited some great work- RFK Funeral Train by Paul Fusco was re-issued and went on my photo book shelf.

29. This past year, I’ve done lots of different projects; I tried my hand at curating at The New York Photo Festival. Seba Kurtis was in another show there- maybe he was the one who got me started on this dreamy kick.

30. And I keep finding amazing new photographers, every day. This morning, Ewen Spencer.

31. And this evening: a birthday cake for me, and what else? Some Shorpy.

Greater Washington circa 1918. "O'Dell, children's party."

VOILA! Now I’m off to the Zombie Hut for some Zombie drinks. I look forward to photography as a 31-year-old, with all of you.

Cheers!

ps. i could have filled this blog post ten times over with a fresh crop of amazing folks, so don’t be mad if i left you off. next year.