Antoan X. Graham

I let it all go. 15 months ago being thrown into what I’ve called ‘My Tenth Life’, I’d created a motto to myself, “There’s everything to believe in, when you don’t believe in anything anymore”. An expression of what I’ve always felt has defined my character - an underlying morbidity and a ceilingless optimism - I began 2024 sheerly motivated that an emptied person only has everything to gain Late-Feb, one day unintentionally not opening IG turned into an intentional second day, and that somehow became a month, two, three. But soon came an absolute bodily-resistance, a stomach-turning disassociation to open any social media, that I then couldn’t; I think it was my brain’s signal flairs needing me to ground back in the analog just a bit longer. I only had whoever I’d already exchanged numbers with, my only knowing of people’s lives by speaking with and seeing them. The 6 months that indefinite hiatus happened to last was enriching I shy away from you when I shy away from me, but sometimes we need a mirror to understand how we’re changing. Online, and especially those 6 months unplugged, I know I have such a beautiful mirror in my chosen community 2024 I re-visited heavy-hearted places, paid them sincere company and peace, and my world feels just a bit lighter.. These posted March~Nov moments are all love - that I’ve received, that I’ve given, that I’ve witnessed, that I’ve experienced. I still don’t quite have a definition for the word, but I’ve felt it all throughout my life. I ask you pause at each of these, & mirror them to memories and feelings you’ve known. The throughline isn’t always overt. You will always have everything to believe in, but believe in You first, and the rest will come together I end this year leaps better than I’d started. And I can’t be stopped from here. . Now (& a lifetime ago) playing: “Love Is” - Prequel ft Cazeaux O.S.L.O; one of my 2024 anthems along with Cleo Sol’s “Know That You Are Loved”, since they each first found me on different summer nights. I find parallel that while Cleo Sol’s is a reminder of the Love we Have, this song is a statement of, literally to its name, all that Love Is.  . . #LearningToBeVisible #always823

It all amounts to something. This has been maybe my favourite photo I've taken in the last three years, i.e. entirety of being gifted my first "serious" camera (a Sony a6400) and self-teaching photography since. My decade's resolution, NYE 2019, was "Learning to Be Visible" - humbly knowing I've grown a musical talent my whole life and a creative outlook to how I approach everything else because of that, but feeling not even anger but almost..an "unfortunateness" that I hadn't lived up to or given full 'respect' to my ability in the decade-past, and the friends, teachers, experiences, everything that's inspired my form till then. Galactic self-pressure I know lol, but it's the honesty of what I was reflecting on. Ending 2019/the decade, I was newly listening to "How to Be Invisible" by Thrupence [@thrupencemusic ] - one of the most beautiful songs I've ever heard put simply, and a close-to-homeness for it being a piano piece at root (go put it on and revisit this post). The song feels like a passing send-off, but there was almost a panic thinking "I don't need to know, anymore, 'how to be invisible'...you've only felt invisible". And...you understand how my decade-long resolution was made. I feel a lot of self-gratitude capturing this photo, but more importantly for 'seeing' the shot in the first place. Because more than executing on the technical stuff (good composition, 'the exposure triangle', yadda yadda) - it means I'm actually capably, and consciously, uncovering my own personality in my photos the same way I have in my music compositions; "luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity". When I first reviewed this photo back at home, it felt like standing beside myself and saying "you're really figuring this stuff out". So far only this, and my NYE 2023 photos before this, have perfectly captured the heart of what I want to display. Bringing these topics full circle, I'm seeing myself in new ways of expression, and for the continuation that means for myself and my identity: Learning to Be Visible. Do what you love. It all amounts to something. 20230218, 5:03pm. No edit. . . #LearningtoBeVisible #always823 #fujifilmxpro3 #xf1680mm #trix400

Unrequited Love - Antoan Graham

Energy is contagious Note to self because Ima forget. Next is proximity programming. Then risk getting into the room. Then being in the room is the product Clip farmer: @_xaviour_ Edited by moi I wanted to push the colours a bit this time

© Antoan X. Graham • @_xaviour_ ___________________________ ♠️ 𝐎𝐩𝐞𝐧 𝐂𝐚𝐥𝐥 #𝟏𝟏 officially closed on December 31st, but we are continuing to feature standout works from the final pool of submissions while the curation process takes place. ♠️ Final selection for 𝐀𝐧𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐡𝐲º𝟑 and the 𝐈𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐄𝐱𝐡𝐢𝐛𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 is currently being reviewed by @anne.murayama , assisted by @meitanteisara . We are thrilled to announce that our exhibition lineup is now fully confirmed: 🇫🇷 @carre59.versailles led by @a_rc_her 🇮🇹 @spazioholo led by @giovannella.pirina 🇬🇧 @photomafiastudios led by @joe_westley_photo ♠️ Please note that beyond the automatic receipt from the submission form, we do not send individual confirmation emails. The next and final notification you receive will be the 𝐨𝐟𝐟𝐢𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐥 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐮𝐥𝐭𝐬, sent to everyone via email once the review is complete. 🔗 Stay tuned at www.ephemere.tokyo ※ 𝘼𝙣 𝙄𝙣𝙨𝙩𝙖𝙜𝙧𝙖𝙢 𝙛𝙚𝙖𝙩𝙪𝙧𝙚 𝙞𝙨 𝙖 𝙘𝙪𝙧𝙖𝙩𝙤𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙡 𝙨𝙥𝙤𝙩𝙡𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙩 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙙𝙤𝙚𝙨 𝙣𝙤𝙩 𝙜𝙪𝙖𝙧𝙖𝙣𝙩𝙚𝙚 𝙛𝙞𝙣𝙖𝙡 𝙨𝙚𝙡𝙚𝙘𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣 𝙛𝙤𝙧 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙥𝙪𝙗𝙡𝙞𝙘𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣 𝙤𝙧 𝙚𝙭𝙝𝙞𝙗𝙞𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣𝙨.

20250613 // Home Can Be Unfamiliar. It’s Not always what I knew best always new always best It’s Naught, always what I knew best. —- Slide 1, wonder what they see in the distance Slide 2, the water’s dozen faces (find them) Slide 3 is the “finished photo”, as I interpret from what I captured Slide 4-6 is what I captured; rightside-up, uncropped. . Now (& a lifetime ago) playing: “Windmills” [2021] - @Anchorsongjp . I first heard of Anchorsong on Jan 4th 2024; not being even a week into ‘24 yet, I treated his song “Serendipity” as my intro theme for that year and the potential my heart desperately needed it to have Almost 1.5yrs later, this past summer near the date I shot this photo, I was reacquainted with Anchorsong’s music, newly hearing this song “Windmills”. Serendipity and Windmills both narrate well my changing relationship with the unfamiliar as I see/hear/live it Recounting two unique chapters, it’s a story I enjoy hearing them both tell. . . #LearningtoBeVisible #always823 — 🎞️ Dev&Scan’d by @downtowncameraltd #120 #rolleiinfrared #pentax645

20250613 // Easedropping [sic]. —- It seemed like..an odd place to be. Roots perfectly shaped and intact for a pot, yet seemingly stripped of one. If intended waste, I imagine it woulda been tossed in the bin beside it. Roadside memorial..? ..it’s not communicating that much to me, but what would I know. I fixated on it for a few-too-many minutes, passerbys glanced over at the nothing that I was spectating, this half a year now only identifying it as “thrown flowers” - I suppose what I’d title the full uncropped photo as shown on the 4th slide. We were at a corner of 📍Hokkaido Ramen Santouka Dundas E - my first ever ramen restaurant from ~2016, so an appreciated revisit when I find myself by Sankofa Square. After I finally ate inside and was exiting, I noticed the writing on both the doorway’s walls to my left and right - If I have any curious preoccupation than (publicly discarded) flowers, it’s scrawlings and the infinite ambiguity to the people behind them. At that doorway, it felt like I was literally eavesdropping standing between the two scrawled messages facing each other, as if they were in conversation; similar to hardly an hour earlier, where I felt I was eavesdropping or “intruding” on a story not quite my business to know about the ‘thrown flowers’ so (im)perfectly abandoned where they lay, and the person(s) behind it To the flowers and the scrawls, I project sentiment on their owners’ ease in letting someone or something go, or on the contrary, the unease that led us to where we are In either case, Ease Dropping. . Now (& a lifetime ago) playing: “A New Kind Of Love (Demo)” [~2002] - Frou Frou. . . #LearningtoBeVisible #always823 — 🎞️ Dev&Scan’d by @downtowncameraltd #120 #rolleiinfrared #pentax645

withdrawal. 2025 05 ¿¿ . life, 10x over playing: “dying as a note” [2025] - @PumaBlue . . #LearningtoBeVisible #always823 —- 🎞️ Dev&Scan’d by: @downtowncameraltd #35mm #delta400 #voigtlanderbessar3a

Under the Electric Sky. @edc_lasvegas 20250516-18. . Now (& in the brief quiets of the hotel room, a lifetime ago) playing: “Say Tell Me” [2023] - @TOKiMONSTA . . #always823 #fujifilmx70

20250513, "Fallin,too" // It’s been 12 years since I last visited Niagara Falls with my family in-town from Florida, but through the decade before that, my parents would regularly bring my older brother and I. The distance from Brampton was treacherous ((thought by a child [me] cozily enjoying his Gameboy the whole ride, that bastard)), but it never grew to feel less like a boundless place with how bustling even Clifton Hill was. — The closest I’d been again was a sweet evening visit back in 2020 to Niagara-on-the-Lake. Someone dear needed a breather away from home, and I pitched “let’s go on the road, I’m avail as long as you are. We’ll do our usual..?” The usual was me driving (mostly) straight in one direction for an hour+, and seeing wherev we end up; I don’t know how that ritual started, but it was a practice already going 2 years strong with a childlike ‘here for whatever’ joy to it A new-record 2hrs later till we stopped, it was in N-o-t-L, a town quaint and quiet, unsurely cuz we were fresh into the pandemic.. Completing that trek, we didn’t do much once there; walked a few streets, loved the Greek food at 📍Fournos, then we just..turned all the way back as the sun set. And still, the day ended with our moods restored, and my memory from briefly in that town has persisted I haven’t been there since. Early-May, Mel [@mmduly ] proposed that before all the petals fall, we visit “Magnolia Alley”, now actually at Niagara Falls; we went four days later. 93% of the magnolia were already clapped on the floor (as BlogTO warned they’d soon be), but it was another sweet evening and for me at least, all an eager incentive to see Clifton Hill and the Falls again Somehow, I only shot these three photos the entire day, even given being up the SkyWheel for my first time ever. And still, my memories briefly in this town have persisted I visit them since. . Now (& a lifetime ago) playing: “Niagara Falls” [2025] - The Weeknd; coincidentally my fav song off Hurry Up Tomorrow. The synth riffs, especially in the last chorus played here, are as torrential as I imagine the Falls. . . #always823 — 🎞️ Dev&Scan’d by @downtowncameraltd #120 #rolleiinfrared #pentax645

20250509 // @mereba , live at The Axis Club; a long overdue show for me to have finally seen. I discovered Mereba in summer 2020 through her song “Stay Tru”, one I solidly kept on repeat for the next year+ for how wholehearted and enriching it is. In my story, its truly a memento of that year. Frankly(/unfortunately), since the light of mine had real valleys in following years, it’s a song I’d avoided out of a sad remembering of the “goodness” of 2020; as upside-down as the world had got, it somehow was one of my most joyous years, living on the highs of love and long-awaited accomplishments July 2022, Mereba’s concert was a birthday plan that didn’t get to be followed through. July 2023, as she headlined @itsok.world Festival which I did attend, I had to leave before her performance as I was due to be at 📍History for Joe Kay of Soulection, an event I bought a ticket to prior Now, years after each of those periods and what’s felt like an unequal amount of lifetimes more, I enjoyed another of my concert solo daytes, this time to Mereba I heard “Counterfeit”, what felt like the most encouraging ‘season finale’ theme song to my 2024 I heard “Phone Me” - singlehandedly my fav song off her latest “The Breeze Grew A Fire” album - a song rooted in tribute to the relationships in your life, those thriving and those you may miss watering & I heard “Stay Tru”; and instead of shivering away, I felt again the peace and stillness it gave me that half a decade ago. . . #LearningToBeVisible #always823 #fujifilm_xseries #fujifilmxpro3 “you’re the Original - don’t let ‘em Counterfeit you.”

20250323 (3|3) // The last of my three photosets from the “Portrait Lighting Experience” workshop; photos that’re the most technically messed up and not-as-envisioned from that morning, and yet my favs of the 19 images I’ve shared now, particularly the very last one here. These are the only three shots I took on film with my Pentax 645 camera, my latest cam as of 4-months, but between 28~41yrs old itself. Being my first Medium Format too, it’s easily my heaviest cam that for its shape I’ve dubbed it ‘the black box’ I’m nervous of the risk of error that comes with exclusively shooting film photos on a job, but the tradeoff is I find no photos more pleasing than those shot on film. Likewise, I only pulled out the Pentax 645 at the very end of the workshop Adjusting my camera’s exposure and the studio’s strobe light together, I still managed to underexpose these shots - severely underexpose them. My focusing too was off-target. And it all adds up to a certain mystique that I love. I’m justt cynical enough to feel “it’s nothing of my contribution, it’s because of film's aesthetic and the purple lighting”, but I do believe more that I orchestrated these shots Perfectly-Wrong, the exposure and focus measured right outside of the accuracy that my digital cams would’ve gave me and consequentially been too calculated I don’t know my conclusive point to all this. I’m just pleased with life’s surprises. Sometimes. . From the “Portrait Lighting Experience” workshop; Organizer: Bryan Brock [@bryanbrock_ ] Lead Photo Instructor: Tobias Wang [@visualgram ] Model: Dae Campbell [@daethepoet ] Hair & Make-Up: Sherlyn Torres [@sher_beauty ] Studio: Sorry Studio [@sorrystudioto ] 🎞️ Film: Dev&Scan’d by @mementofilmlab . . #LearningToBeVisible #always823 #120 #pentax645 #vision3500T