When I worked close to an urban center – Ann Arbor and Albion, Michigan, for instance – exploring neighborhoods was a good way to get out, take a walk, and make photos of what I saw. I do it around my own neighborhood, too.
This style of photography reminds me of something William Eggleston would capture: the everyday life of an American town.
Lately, I’m making my way around local neighborhoods I don’t know well. This one, by the city’s primary high school, took me on streets I’ve never seen. I woke up early on a spring morning and took a walk to see what I could see.
Neighborhoods, with good light, are a constant source of good material. I could do this forever.
When Madison McCarver walked into 21Blooms Tattoo Studio in Jackson, portfolio in hand, she was terrified.
She was looking to leave her job in Toledo, where she had apprenticed and worked as a tattoo artist, but she wanted to be closer to home in Ann Arbor.
Taking a deep breath, she introduced herself to the 21Blooms team, laid out her work, and braced for rejection.
Instead, they simply asked, “When can you start?”
It was a moment of validation for Madison, who believes she manifested the life she wanted—one filled with good people, a welcoming environment, and creative freedom.
“This is a good environment,” she says. “Usually, I want to leave work and go home, but here, we’re hanging out in the studio until 8 p.m. because we love what we do.”
From Fine Arts to Tattooing
Art has always been Madison’s escape. As a child, she dabbled in fine arts, portraiture, and even fashion design. In school, her art teachers recognized her talent and submitted her work to competitions, boosting her confidence.
Though she once dreamed of moving to Los Angeles to study fashion, life took a different turn when she enrolled at Washtenaw Community College, where she fell in love with figurative arts and painting.
In 2020, stuck at home during the pandemic, Madison often found herself painting and drawing for 10 hours a day—until burnout set in.
Looking for a change, she took a job at a beauty spa in 2021 but quickly realized the environment wasn’t for her. When she got her first tattoo that year, something clicked. Madison realized tattoo art could become a career.
She started her tattoo apprenticeship that same year, driving from Ann Arbor to Toledo three times a week, practicing on fake skin for nearly a year before moving on to real clients. By 2022, she had graduated from her apprenticeship and officially entered the industry.
Now, three years in, she’s found her rhythm.
“This industry has its challenges, but at the end of the day, I get to draw on people,” Madison says. “Now, I couldn’t see myself doing anything else.”
Artistic Style Fusion
Madison’s art is a fusion of influences: her mother’s love of Rococo, the powerful works of Kehinde Wiley, and the delicate textures of Laura Brevner’s feminine portraits.
She leans into period fashion, the female form, and a mix of vibrant, poppy colors with classic undertones.
Music also plays a significant role in her creative process, from ‘70s funk and soul to modern pop.
“Music influences how I create art. I’m both visual and auditory,” she says. “And that’s my style: colorful, poppy, but classic.”
Teaching and Future Aspirations
Early in her tattoo career, Madison needed a way to make ends meet, so she took a job as a painting instructor at a paint-and-pour studio. Teaching helped her develop patience, communication skills, and a fresh perspective on art.
One moment that stuck with her was working with an older couple who doubted their abilities.
“I had to reassure them: ‘It doesn’t have to look like mine,’” she says.
When they later told her she was an excellent teacher, it reminded her of the impact art—and encouragement—can have on people’s lives.
Looking ahead, Madison wants to continue exploring new artistic avenues. She still paints and is learning oil techniques, dreams of a solo art show, and even dabbles in fashion and cosplay. While tattooing remains her main focus, she hopes to blend her passions in unexpected ways.
“My canvas is skin, but I still love painting,” she says. “I just have to figure out how to meld the two.”
Madison manifested art into her life. Now she can’t live without it.
“If I don’t have art, I might die,” she laughs.
Luckily, at 21Blooms, she’s found a community that supports her growth, shares clients based on specialties, and encourages creativity.
You’d think shooting monochrome with only two “colors” – black and white – would be easy. But photographers’ opinions on black and white film and presets are almost as strong and varied as their opinions on camera companies.
I took a sunny, spring evening in downtown Jackson, Michigan, to try out this black and white emulation. Maybe it was the lighting, maybe it was the simulation, but this was good stuff.
For a contrast-y film simulation, this T-Max picture profile was a good walk-around monochrome standard. If you want to shoot JPGs and not worry about editing, this film emulation is reliable and consistent.
My one suggestion with this profile is to try cranking up the ISO setting on your digital Canon to get more of a filmic grain.
But the deep blacks and good microcontrast? It’s all here.
Spring has finally – and for real – sprung here in Jackson, Michigan.
I woke up early on a Saturday morning, just as the sun was coming up, to walk around Sparks County Park (popularly known as the home of the Cascades) to hear the geese fighting in the water and watch the last of the frost melt away.
Dione Tripp doesn’t just make art—she builds it, reconstructs it, salvages it, and reimagines it.
Growing up in a family of carpenters, inventors, and tinkerers, she was surrounded by the idea that anything could be created with the right tools and vision. Her father was into music, her mother into art, and somewhere in between, Dione found her own voice—one that blends mediums, textures, and emotions into something distinctly her own.
Her artistic journey began with singing, painting, and the idea that she might one day become an art teacher. But she quickly realized her passion wasn’t in teaching—it was in making. Hanging art at the old Thunderbird Café, creating gifts, and submitting pieces for Jackson’s Cool City initiative, she steadily built her presence in the local scene.
Over time, her work evolved beyond traditional canvases into something more layered and more experimental. Even a routine car repair becomes an opportunity. When she gets her brakes changed, she keeps the parts, seeing in them a potential for reinvention.
“How far can you push an object to be a sculpture and not be too crafty?” she asks—a question that continues to shape her process.
Dione pulls from her environment—barn scraps, salvaged materials, even discarded brake parts—to create works that challenge viewers’ perspectives.
“If you’re in a plane, you can see the world differently. I want to express that: the dangers, the fears, the freedom,” she says.
Jackson, Michigan, remains central to her creative world. She studied there, works there, and thrives in its grassroots art community.
“It’s like a blank slate, and we can create our own answers,” she says.
With two to three projects per year, she’s constantly exploring—be it through book illustrations, her new clothing store, or sculptural ideas. While she’s open to branching out, she doesn’t feel limited.
“The only thing limiting me is myself—both in terms of my art and my success,” she says.
Looking ahead, Dione is driven by a desire to amaze herself and find collaborators and appreciators along the way.
“I want to be able to toss ideas around, learn new skills, and try things out,” she says.
Whether it’s trading art, experimenting with new media, or diving deeper into sculpture, she’s on a path of constant evolution—one where every scrap, stroke, and salvaged element has the potential to become something memorable.
Ten years ago, I introduced my first big creative portrait project called Artists In Jackson. Through that project, I got to know our local artists. Together, we told their stories and let our community know we have a talented bunch of people right here in our hometown.
And – bonus! – I met and made some good friends along the way.
Since then, a lot has changed. I worked on a spiritual sequel, Musicians In Jackson, and then the pandemic hit. Here we are five years later, and I’m happy to announce I’m working on my next big portrait project, Artists In Jackson 2.
This one will be a little different. Instead of disappearing for six months and re-emerging with a fancy book and a bunch of pictures, I want to treat this project more like a platform.
Here’s how it works:
Over time, I’ll work on photo subjects and help tell their stories.
You will see these profiles periodically as I work on them and get them done. You don’t have to wait for a book – you’ll see my progress as it’s happening, either on social media or my website.
And it will just keep going. There’s no end, there’s no finish line. Artists In Jackson becomes a platform to tell stories, not a website or a book.
At a point in time, when I have enough profiles done, I can collect them all and make a book or a ‘zine of some kind.
But that’s not the goal. The goal is to tell stories about creative people in our community.
And I have some profiles already set up to publish – one, reaching back several years, on Dione Tripp (above). Others I have a head-start on and you’ll see those soon. As always, I’m open to your ideas and tips on creative people in and from Jackson.
I hope you’ll join me in this new experiment. I’m excited to once again share these homegrown artists, their work, and their stories.
Do you want to know the benefits of being a hobbyist photographer?
No pressure.
No client to please. No money to make. No expectations. No deadlines.
If I’m working on a big portrait project, the only deadlines or expectations are the ones I put on myself. And I do, but no one else knows that. It’s just me.
I can go out on a foggy winter morning, after dropping off the kids at school but before heading to work, and explore. Just me and my own desire to make something, see something, photograph something.
I’m kissing Squarespace goodbye and moving my two portrait projects to my blog. Instead of sending web traffic somewhere else, Artists In Jackson and Musicians In Jackson—as they’re updated—will live here, where visitors can learn more about my other projects.
As I was putting together the project landing pages, I remembered JTV’s Bart Hawley Show featured Musicians In Jackson late in 2019, but I never shared that conversation on this blog.
Parts of the U.S. are facing an arctic blast – one of those goofy named weather phenomena. In the past few winters, we haven’t had much winter action in Michigan. So on this occasion, I laced up my snow boots and walked around the neighborhood to see what five degrees felt like.
The bright sun and crisp air were nice for a brief minute. But then the wind would pick up and I felt like my face was stinging.
Not much to say on this, the day after the U.S. election, but a few thoughts I had this morning waking up to the news:
Info bubbles are bad—it’s so important to step outside of what you normally read about or hear and listen to other echo chambers.
“Vibes” alone aren’t enough to sway people who have legitimate concerns about the country’s direction.
Who shows up matters and ultimately determines the outcome. If you don’t have the votes, you don’t win – simple, but hard to execute.
America is a tough place to understand sometimes, and it’s getting tougher.
I’m sad and nervous. I’m also dumping my usual sources for information (Twitter – deleted my account, and Reddit for general browsing) and am committed to casting a weary, skeptical eye on news media reports that seem confident.
In the meantime, we all have feelings to process and art to make. Let’s get back to work.
It’s a false summer night – part of a week full of those final warm days before autumn sets in.
Autumn means marching band season, so Aiden and I headed to Jackson High’s football field for his first practice session. It gave me a chance to catch some of the light and colors around the stadium.
Shot on the Canon M200 with the EF-M 15-45mm kit lens.
The above is the same house taken at the same time of year, within a day or two of each other, just at different times during the morning.
I drive by this little house a few times a week. For months, I’ve thought to myself: “That would make for a good photograph.” Finally, one morning, I had time enough to pull over and take the shot. The first attempt is the one on the left.
The light is okay. There’s a touch on the front porch and a bit on the left near the chair—that golden morning light hitting halfway between the front door and the stairs.
But something felt off when I got back and imported the picture into Lightroom. The house itself is too much in the shade, while the lawn and the trees on the right have a neutral, even light. The fluffy clouds in the upper left are a nice touch though.
So I gave it another try, this time earlier in the morning when the sun was hitting the entire house on the side, coming from the East on the left. Angled shadows hit the lawn and the front of the house, and the sunshine lit up that (cursed) Ohio flag. The porch is a bit more in shade, but there’s still a touch of light hitting the chair.
The temperature of the light, too, is different in the second shot: it is more golden and a bit harsher, painting the scene with a more dramatic brush. I do miss those fluffy clouds from the first image, though.
Both are fine. I’m glad I took another stab at it. The light was worth waiting for.
Here’s the final photo:
Both images shot with the Canon M6 and EF-M 28mm f/3.5 macro.
We’ve always been a musical family, but we officially became a musical theatre family this fall.
The women in our group all joined the cast of Center Stage Jackson‘s Chitty Chitty Bang Bang – my daughter Madelyn taking a lead role as Jemima, Riley as one of the ensemble kids, and Jaime as the wicked baroness.
That meant lots of light nights, back and forth trips to rehearsal, and tired kiddos who aren’t used to staying up late for practice. But the last two weekends, it all came together.
The show’s director, Lisa, is a close family friend, and she let me hang out back stage for some behind the scenes photography.
Supporting the local arts in our communities means showing up, and lending talents where needed.
