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People Are Curious
Kevin Connolly's worldwide journey inspires photos, images and understanding
Story by Suzi Taylor
Photography by Kevin Connolly |
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| MSU student Kevin Connolly was born without legs, but with an abundance of talent that is already taking him places. |
In many ways, Kevin Connolly appears to be your typical American college student. He skis. He skateboards. He likes to kick back with friends and have a beer. He loves to travel, and is usually planning his next trip before he's finished the last.
Yet, Kevin Connolly is not typical. He earned a silver medal in skiing at the X Games, widely considered the pinnacle of extreme sports competitions. He's an avid reader, devouring everything from the biography of Stanley Kubrick to "100 Years of Solitude." At the ripe age of 22, he's been around the world twice, most recently visiting 31 cities in 15 different countries during the summer of 2007. And, Connolly, a senior in media and theater arts, is already a prolific photographer with a professional body of work and a calendar beginning to fill with gallery shows and speaking engagements.
There's something else that distinguishes Connolly, or, as he himself puts it, "The no legs thing."
Connolly was born without legs. There's no explanation for it other than "sporadic birth defect." Sure, Connolly says, something like shark attack or mortar explosion are much more dramatic; people often ask if he's been in a car accident or had an amputation.
"For someone seeing me for the first time, all of these stories are equally plausible," said Connolly, who, after a lifetime of observing reactions, has come to accept surprise. But his growing interest in art and self-expression led him to want to document the reaction as a mirror of a more universal truth: mankind's need to invent stories for things that may not make sense.
"The larger question is: Why do we feel the need to craft a story for someone that seems different?" Connolly asks.
The journey to answer that question-or at least capture the seeds that lead to thoughtful discussion-took Connolly from his hometown of Helena to Asia, to Europe and points in between, over 11 weeks during his summer break. Traveling on a student fare airline ticket funded by his X Games winnings, his goal was to develop a portfolio of work he began in 2006, a photo series called "The Rolling Exhibition."
Shooting from the hip
Connolly travels by skateboard, propelling himself with his arms. To build his photo collection, he positions his digital Nikon at his hip, and shoots passers-by from ground level, which sometimes means dodging moving traffic. He doesn't look through the viewfinder but relies on instinct and practice to frame the images. The shots are mysterious and thought provoking.
| A few people offered him money. Some thought he was a holy man. Others simply avoided him, and some openly asked for an explanation. |
His collection includes children, workers, beggars, cops, lovers. Nearly all of them are strangers. Connolly says he seeks to capture the moment of uncertainty when a person sees another person with no legs, a skateboard and a camera, and tries to make some sense out of it.
"It's about people," Connolly said of his work. "There's a moment when people look, and you can tell they're trying to get a story."
Photography is a recent undertaking for Connolly, who said he didn't shoot a full roll of film until his first black and white photography class at MSU. He credits his passion for the craft to MSU independent study courses and structured film classes, as well as his appreciation for photographers like Jonas Bendiksen, who photographed Russian "fringe towns" over a seven-year period.
"I really admire people who do more than just observe behind their camera," said Connolly. "To have someone willing to go out in the field and fully immerse themselves in their subjects is a pretty amazing thing."
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