Upstate 𓃚 Solitaire

The Amish are an exclusive group whose culture is shaped by a deep suspicion of the outside, non-Amish world. They resist conforming to dominant society and instead opt out of everything we city dwellers take for granted. To me, that makes them punk. I like to think of my work as a glimpse of what we might look like if we too choose to ditch the script.

At first it was the rarity of the photographs I was bringing home that attracted me — how very few people have laid eyes on a community so different, and I was the agent making it visible. But over time, something shifted. I began to think about how the Amish, a culture without photographers, might one day seem to have never existed at all. It became an act of philanthropy. It became more about them and less about the viewer. My work is for them, not for you.