Honoring the people in front of my camera is one way I feel I can bring positivity to life. These portraits are friends, family, strangers and commissions that I’ve completed over the last year or two.

I’ve been a musician and a photographer almost all of my life. I would almost call it a duty that I feel in capturing the creative magnetism of musicians and artists. I understand completely the tight rope walk of introversion and extroversion they live daily and enjoy celebrating their magical personalities.

Our world is made interesting by our pursuit of creation in any form. To me chefs are anxious rockstars, acting like creative directors, in aprons. I get them. Visualizing and celebrating the food they create is something I will never grow tired of exploring.

This work is part of an extended visual poem representing the more visceral moments between people and places in the Midwest. Like music, these photographs celebrate the mystery and wonder of shared experiences. Without the visual grandeur of a place like the American desert or the northern latitudes of Iceland, the camera must evoke drama in other ways. These forced image combinations reveal evocative new contexts and non-obvious qualities: a mysteriousness prescribed by Ohio Valley light, a new sense of weight and form, and a startling respect for the subjects, human or otherwise. Themes of love, solitude, and the memories or people we fear losing are presented here like short love songs. A formal photographic treatment draws attention to what might have been too obvious to notice. These realistic images take on new fictional life in their designed sequencing, which often places one or more images against each other, giving rise to new visual phrases. In this work, one is reminded of the subtle magic that photography delivers and the moments it so effectively honors.

Media: toned archival pigment prints on bamboo paper from analog and digital negatives

This work was first shown at Manifest Gallery in Cincinnati, Ohio during the fall of 2024

Cuba is vibrant and rich beyond all of my inadequate preconceptions. The country’s extremes unfolded looking at once like welcoming smiles and decaying infrastructure. I anxiously put myself into the rich world that lies only ninety miles from the coast of Florida in the fall of 2014. My vulnerability was rewarded with the trust and love of the human spirit that surrounded me.

Life often turns out differently than you thought it would. You aren’t where you thought you would be, doing what you thought you would do, with the people you thought you would be with. Some days you realize you are outside, surrounded by people, and you are the odd one out. These images highlight and normalize a universal feeling of displacement. Sometimes we just are. And that’s ok.

About this series:

The complete series is comprised of 29 images. All images are available in limited edition archival prints. Inquire about fine prints.

An oversized limited edition zine is available containing all 29 of the series. Order it here.

An interview regarding this work was done with Leica Camera. You can find it here.

From 2015 until 2019 I went to Iceland four times trying diligently to get my head around its wonders. Some of this work was originally published in The Photographic Journal as a series called Search Party. You can view it here.

This work was originally created for Edible Ohio Valley Magazine. I quickly fell in love with Chef Willocks’ vision and approach to original food created with seasonal and local ingredients. The Baker’s Table is the real deal. Like a flag of sorts, a poster hanging in the kitchen boldly proclaims “Give a fuck.”. I too tried to stick to that ethos as I made these images.

The English Tradition of the fox hunt is alive and well in the hills east of Cincinnati. This work celebrates the beauty and traditions that remain today in a world so far removed from the sporting rituals of yesterday. The hunt is no longer a hunt to the finish as the foxes are merely chased but the spirit of community and sport thrives. Created for the Camargo Hunt, Cincinnati Ohio.

This work was awarded a Best-In-Show Award of Excellence from Communications Arts in their 2023, 64th Photography Annual.

In the fall of 2023 I had the chance to do work for the relaunched print version of the esteemed Saveur Magazine. Working with The Berry Center run by Mary Berry, daughter of esteemed activist writer Wendel Berry, I focused on storytelling the many angles of raising eco-friendly, ethically raised sustainable beef. This product used by higher-end restaurants or consumers to which this approach has appeal is an anomaly in the mass-produced manufacturing of food that is pervasive today.

This assignment also had me partnered with my childhood friend Keith Pandolfi a veteran writer and journalist. Locations were in New Castle KY, Midway KY, Lexington KY and Ohio to complete all of the imagery. I met many wonderful people.

Photography // Michael Tittel
Writer // Keith Pandolfi
Photo Editor // Thom Payne
Alex Testere // Senior Features Editor
Editor-in-Chief / CEO // Kat Craddock

This body of work was created for an advertising agency that was in search of a photographic approach to elevate this tequila brand to a more premium visual language. Over the course of two days I created a series of specific visual guides each with a distinct style and creative strategy behind it. These are some of the results from this creative exploration.

Promotional work created to help promote wedding vendors and small businesses in the Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky area.

Forbidden is the spirit industry’s first white corn and white winter wheat expression of bold Kentucky Bourbon. The design of the brand and bottle is complex, multi-faceted and exudes a non-traditional and distinctively premium feel. The bottle and beverages were photographed in multiple settings to create a high-quality brand library for the client. Design by Holotype Studio. Creative Director Dale Doyle. Styling, retouching and photography by MT.