how’d I get here?

Alongside forging a commitment to combating oppression and instilling the mantra, De Oppresso Liber, as the central tenet to my personal ethos, coming of age as a Special Forces Weapons Sergeant shaped my warrior identity. With that identity has come practices that have allowed me to cope with it, and to this day, being behind a gun is the most relaxing and reflective meditative practices I've ever engaged with. However, since moving to New England for graduate school, I can’t shoot near as much as I would like to. As the stress and anxiety of grad student life amplified, I sought a practice to manage my mental health. When I was in the Army and contracting on an Embassy Protection Detail in Kabul, I took a camera essentially everywhere I carried a my AR, which is where I became familiar with photography. Given that, unlike guns, I can shoot photos anywhere (for the most part), in the fall of 2018, I decided to dust off my Nikon D3300 and start shooting photography more intentionally. While shooting more deliberately, I was surprised at how similar the fundamentals between shooting guns and cameras are; breathing techniques, stance, and position, are all virtually the same, and acquiring a sight picture is eerily similar. Incorporating creation into my daily life has since led to my purchase of a Canon 6d Mk II and some lenses.

alongside philosophy, I have gained a fascination with time and light, so I engage in a philosophical meditation every time I squeeze the shutter to capture a moment. I am still in love with shooting guns and hit the range as much as possible, but the fundamental difference I have noticed between the two is simple: squeezing a trigger is intrinsically destructive and squeezing a shutter is necessarily creative. There's just something about being at one with the world looking at it through glass, if only for an instant, that brings me a tremendous stillness. In addition to the positive effects photography has had on my mental health, I have also become a pretty fuckin’ dope photographer, so this website is a chronicle of my journey through art, and a dedication to everyone who continues to inspire me to be better.

 on Trillosophy

Trillosophy is a concept that has been inspired by a number of people and movements. First and foremost, shout out Bun B and #RIP Pimp C. When Billboard asked him what the message of Return of the Trill, his most recent studio album was, he responded, “I wanted to bring it back to the original meaning of trill. It doesn't mean "be a gangster." Trill doesn't mean "do drugs." Trill doesn't mean "be in a gang and have that ass whooped." Trill is just about being trill; about being real with who you are and keeping it 100 with yourself. Because if you can't keep it 100 with yourself and be happy with who you are, then you can't keep it 100 with me.” But more than authenticity, Trillosophy is, at bottom, a recognition of the brilliance of Southern Hip-Hop philosophy and how it has rooted me to myself over everything I’ve been through over the years. Growing up in Wilmington, NC, I was forged by Southern rap subgenres and captivated by the medium’s ability to speak Truth in the face of catastrophe.

The -osophy in Trillosophy is a reference to my study of philosophy, or in Greek, philosophia, philo- meaning love and -sophia meaning wisdom, all together giving us, ‘love of wisdom.’ In this sense, Trillosophy can be understood as the ‘wisdom of Trill’. I center these influences in my professional academic life through asserting hip-hop as philosophically rich, aesthetically sophisticated, and culturally hegemonic tradition that provides a dire intervention in the whiteness that is philosophical discourse. My aim with trillosophy photo is to apply these influences to my photographic praxis as a means of disrupting ‘traditional’ ways of knowing, resisting epistemic, pedagogical, & moral narcissism, and broadening our conceptions of who can do (and does) philosophy and what doing philosophical actually looks like. Trillosophy Photo’s aim is to capture Truth through the camera lens.