TFOM: The First of Many

A platform for presence. A movement for more. Built to honor the people behind the practice.

The First of Many (TFOM) was never about claiming we were the first. It emerged from a simple but profound question: What becomes possible when artists are given space—space to reflect, to speak, to be seen, and to be heard, even by themselves? What started as quiet test shoots in my studio became a gathering place for honesty, openness, and connection. It became a practice of showing up for one another.

From that space came the “first of many”:
first breakthroughs, first releases, first risks, first moments of grace, first shifts in one’s practice, first time being witnessed fully, first time naming something that had gone unspoken. TFOM honors these beginnings—not as finalities, but as openings.

At its heart, TFOM is a living archive of community, shaped through portraiture, conversation, and shared presence. The work spans homes and studios, city streets and kitchen tables, each image and interview building a constellation of artists whose stories often go unseen or misread. TFOM resists that erasure by prioritizing care, truth-telling, and intentional visibility.

TFOM has always been about continuous conversation and connection. About slowing down enough to sit with who we are and who we are becoming. About honoring the people behind the work—their processes, their histories, their vulnerabilities, their brilliance. Every portrait, every exchange, every gathering asks: How does your story want to be held?

Representation sits at the center of this project—not as performance, but as access. Representation as a doorway. Representation as possibility. Representation as the light that signals it is safe to exist, safe to imagine, safe to continue. TFOM affirms that people have always belonged in the room; the project simply clears space for that truth to be witnessed.

What began as a personal inquiry is now an expanding ecosystem of photographs, interviews, programs, and a forthcoming documentary. Together, they form an archive that breathes, remembers, and resists. TFOM is an offering, a mirror, and a map—an evolving testament to what can happen when we center care, visibility, and community.

This is The First of Many.