Quarantine Memphis Project
The Memphis Quarantine Project started on March 13, 2020, when I, along with many others, officially started distancing from one another. I thought I needed something to keep me busy but still be safe. Assuming this would only be for a few weeks I asked a friend if I could photograph them from outside their home. This led to posting an open invitation on social media, and the project quickly grew to hundreds of people. I eventually reached over 1,200 people on the sign up link before I had to put a freeze on it.
From March 13 through May 31, 2020, I photographed over 800 dwellings and 2,000 people with an average of 13 photoshoots a day, each lasting between 15 -30 minutes. Leah Keys, my partner, sorted and scheduled all 800 requests by zip code and surrounding cities in the greater Memphis area with daily efficiency routes, which made it possible to keep such a tight schedule. After the photos were taken, there was still editing and sorting to do. Generally 8 hours of shooting would be another 8 hours of editing. So even though the shooting stopped June 1, the editing continued every day until July.
The project was free for participants. Each home, person, or family received a private web link with edited images that they could download at no charge. Although many people donated to the project, it was never advertised as a requirement in efforts to keep participation equitable.
