The cool part about New York is that you can do that. You can talk to all the people you admire.

I'm going to put every aspect of myself out into the world and try to convey it through photography.

I couldn't wait to come to New York to reinvent myself.

My dad was in the Korean War. He got shot seven times. He had seven bullet holes in him. And out of his troop of 35 guys, he was one of nine guys that came back. And when he came back from that he had seven kids in seven years.

My mom had seven kids in seven years, and then she had me 11 years later. So when I was born, my oldest brother was 18. And my youngest brother was 11. By the time I was 7 or 8, everyone had moved out. I went from being with ten people all the time to being an only child. It really freaked me out.

In college, all my friends were graffiti writers, but I never wrote graffiti. I wanted to participate and do something cool on the street, so I'd make these portraits of people. I'd isolate them on a white wall, make a silkscreen of it, and do these portraits in bathrooms and all around. That's how I started the Polaroids.

I can work with shyness, but for the most part I want people to feel comfortable with me. It's really more about the photographer feeing comfortable right when they walk in that makes the subject feel comfortable.