I watched my mother when I was young and learned a lot about photography from her. The way I shoot my personal work is very much the way she shoots: always carrying a camera, stopping what you're doing to pull it out when you see a pictures. Aside from a few photo classes when I was a teenager, almost all of my photography training was as an assistant. I had the amazing opportunity to work with Nan Goldin for three years, and I learned an incredible amount from her. I learned a lot about the history of photography - she has an incredible knowledge, especially about old, black and white photography - and I learned a lot about the editing process. In the end, how you go about editing your work is just as important as what you shoot, maybe even more so. The other thing that was so important for me in working with Nan was that she was someone I had completely idolized, and I think there's something very freeing about having your idols brought down to earth, learning that they're real people, and especially getting to see their creative process. For me it made her work much more tangible, and it bridged that mental gap of, I could never make anything that great so I shouldn't even try. Most of us probably won't get to make work as seminal as what Nan has done, but seeing behind the curtain made me understand that it's still worth trying.
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