2026 06 22
Letās spend some brainpower thinking through a modified approach to one of my businesses, shall we? My studio space, See You Soon at the Kimball Arts Center, is still very much finding its identity even after four years of existence. What I imagined the space to be did not really pan out. In some ways the differences have been better and in other ways far more challenging than anticipated. The reasons are many, and the control I have over the reasons span the entire spectrum, from totally my fault to didnāt see it coming from a mile away. Today, letās focus on things I can control, specifically: what is See You Soon?
See You Soon Originally was:
A commercial photo studio
Clayton Hauckās space to do stuff and try things
A rental photo studio
Through the years, new identities have come and gone. Broadly speaking, the space has organically shifted more towards being an event space than it is a photo studio, both for reasons of necessity (financial) and due to where Iāve chosen to focus my energies. While the future existence of See You Soon is currently in limbo, I think itās quite valuable to give it my best effort as we steadily move towards the completion of our initial five-year lease, even if we donāt end up renewing (for the record, my goal is not to close, however, Iāve come to the point where that outcome will not bother me should it happen. Additional time to do things like photograph Michiganās Upper Peninsula sounds very appealing to me).
See You Soon Now:
An event space, primarily focused on visual arts and photography
An outlet for Chicagoās creative community
A place for creative people to come together
So, how do we make this new identity work?
2026 02 05: Blog/Life Focus
Yesterday, my mother-in-law asked me if the studio has had many bookings lately. Much like the nonstop madness of US and world events, which blurs reality itself, my life has been far too packed with stuff lately. The week-long play Iād hosted in my space, which was directed by Kevin Coval who she also knows, didnāt even come to mind. It both somehow feels like years ago and has already been shoved towards the back of my brainās usable memory.
This is bad!
I need to slow the fuck down and do some more reflection and documentation (see: promotion) of my own life. When Iām not even remembering the things Iām doing, how can anyone else have a chance of knowing what Iām up to? My challenge is always in figuring out how to best āpromoteā myself. It never feels right to me (have you subscribed to my new substack?!). Weāll continue to work on it.
Lastly, I aim to tweak the focus of this here blog a bit moving forward. My aim is to keep the images more timely; so either images made within the last month or so, or images made in the same season from previous years. Also, Iād like to bring more humanity to the images. Too much of what Iām posting is stuff. I like the stuff, but I think itās hard to get anyoneās attention posting only photos of trash on the lawn and cigarettes on the cement.
2026 01 27
Currently, the photo studio that I opened four years ago is undergoing a transformation of sorts. While photo will always be a part of my life, when it comes to the studio, my current aim is to pivot quite dramatically away from photo and towards events. Iām in the process of sorting out the boring-but-necessary backend stuff (namely: insurance). Once I get that figured out, Iām excited to make a push and get focused on seeing results for my efforts. While Iāve always loved the space, itās never had much of a focus; weāll aim to change that. Our lease expires in one year, so itās sort of make-or-break now-or-never time. Hit me up if you need a room for a birthday party!
2026 01 07: Keep it 100
In attempting to make good on one of my year-end resolutions (see: 2025 12 30), Iāve got my āKeep it 100ā portraits sessions on offer from January 8-13. Since I opened up bookings so last minute, Iām going to have a very hard time of getting people to sign up, which will likely spiral me back into a pessimistic outlook on the whole thing. Ho hum. If you want to book a session, you can do so here; and if you use the code KEEP-IT-100, youāll unlock the insanely low price of $100 for an individual session.