Me - The Bio

I was born a poor Mets-fan but things only really got confusing when I was moved, kicking, screaming, cussing and pouting, to New England – the domain of the Boston Red Sox.

It’s an absurdly existential way to think of things, I admit, but as I can pretty much peg that change as one of the most defining events in my life, I think it’s an important one. As it were, I failed to escape unscathed as many years down the road I emerged: an artist, pacifist, socialist, as well as a blasted Red Sox fanatic. Never forget the impact your choices may have on the future of your children. Two World Series later it seems ok, but . . .

Not that any of that really has much bearing on what you’re here for, but I like to talk about myself, so please do me a favor and live with it.

AHEM. Sometimes I forget to play nice with the kind visitors to my website . . . Please accept my apologies now and I’ll start again.

I, Sean Hennessey, was inflicted upon an unsuspecting New York City in 1970, but saw out the 80’s, 90’s and the early 00’s in and around New England (where the world chose to perfect the art of autumn). Sometime around 1990, I attended Keene State College, in Keene, NH, as a film student, where I developed my twin passions for film photography and writing. Photography eclipsed my interest in cinematic work, a change cemented when I moved to study at Goldsmith’s College, in London, where they had a non-existent film department. My interest in essay and fiction writing trumped screenwriting after I discovered the work of Spaulding Gray and Martin Amis..

After my deportation from England, essentially for wearing out my welcome (they can only stomach Americans in three year spurts, or so it seems), I found myself, as some deviated definition of an adult, living in Boston, Massachusetts. Boston is the city I still refer to as home, despite having left it in 2002 for Portland, Oregon – a place where it’s gonna take my lovely Jewish mother a friggin’ crowbar to get me out of.

Portland is really the most important part of this story because it was there I met two of the most important women in my life – the writer, Meg Jensen, and the photographer, Pat Bogner. Through studying with them I’ve discovered depths within my art I’ve never before reached. Without them there would be no call for this site, no writing for me to share, no darkroom work to keep me smelling like chemicals, and very little forward motion to my life.

This site is dedicated to them, my ever-nosy mother, Rupa (who kept prodding me to post my work online so she can see it, all the way from East Dummerston, Vermont), and to JC Penny’s for providing me with my first Pentax K1000 way back in 1990. I still think it was nicer than any digital camera I’ve ever purchased.

Peace – Sean