Last week, Karrisa, Alex and I headed up to New York for an action-packed day of meetings and portfolio reviews. The day began with the three of us in the beautiful (and enormous) offices of JWT. Many of the art buyers we met with already used the site regularly to find photographers, but were happy to learn about our production, stock and crew resources. The celebrity portraits from Marc Royce and Jeremy Cowart were especially well-received.
After our morning meeting wound down, we packed up the books and went our separate ways; Alex and I to Women’s Health, and Karrisa to review books at ICP’s career day.
We walked into the offices of Rodale just as a dozen or so staff were headed into midday yoga. We were wearing entirely wrong pants, or we might have jumped in. Instead, we met with Associate Photo Editor Brona Hatchette, who took time out of a very busy day to review a portfolios and learn more about how we could work with them to source stock and locate new shooters around the world. She explained that while most of their beauty and lifestyle images were sourced from stock, most of their photography budget went to conceptual, still life assignment, typically shot in New York. She really enjoyed looking at the food work of Michael Piazza, and still life from Monica Stevenson.
All of our meetings were within walking distance around Midtown, so we packed up our cart and headed out on a very hot and muggy day to the offices of Bon Appétit. We met with Photo Editor Rachel Tomlinson, who was well acquainted with our roster and a frequent user of our site, so she had great things to say about a number of our shooters who she was able to find in smaller and international markets.
Rachel really enjoyed the work of Peter Taylor, Kyle Dreier and Ball & Albanese.
Back on the steaming pavement, we headed to our last meeting of the day — Rolling Stone. Our first order of business was to ask the receptionist about the smashed guitar in the waiting area. He explained (for the ten thousandth time) that it belonged to, and was smashed by, Pete Townshend!
We met with three of the photo editors, who told us that they mainly assign portraiture, with a strong preference for grittier, less polished images. They were especially impressed with the portfolios of Tim Klein and David E. Jackson.
While Alex and I sweated between meetings, Karrisa enjoyed the air-conditioned bliss of ICP, reviewing portfolios of recent graduates. She was there alongside dozens of representatives from galleries, magazines and news outlets. She met with 12 photographers to review work and offer advice on branding, marketing and breaking into the industry as a young shooter.
That evening, with our meetings wrapped up, we all headed across town to Pony Bar in Hell’s Kitchen. We caught up with Wonderful Machine photographers Giovanni Savino, Greta Rybus, Ashok Sinha and Will Styer, and had a great time nerding-out, sharing iPad portfolios and telling stories of recent shoots.
After another terrific day of meetings and networking, we piled ourselves and our cases back in the car, and headed home to Philadelphia.
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