WINTER VACATION MAGIC//BAY AREA'S BEST DOG PHOTOGRAPHER JESSE FREIDIN

I recently returned from a whirl-wind tour of the East Coast (my stomping grounds). I spent a week in New York City, schmoozing various galleries and animal rescue groups. Had a great meeting with my good friends at The Impossible Project. Bought my first fully custom suit (a modern black cut with red pinstripe lining!!) from Alabaster and Chess. Then I zipped over to Boston for a meeting with one of my favorite Boston galleries, Gallery Kayafas. Schmoozed some of the best dog stores in GBA (that's Greater Boston Area, to you left-coasters), and finally landed on Cape Cod for a few days of R&R. Cape Cod in the winter is a magical place. It is very cold. And very desolate. And very, very beautiful. There is no other place in the world more inspiring to me than Cape Cod. Maybe it is because I grew up spending time out there, worked summers in a hot Cape Cod restaurant for many years, rode my skateboard through Provincetown during the summers. It makes me want to wake up early every day and put a camera up to my face until the sun disappears. It's also where I bought my very first Polaroid Land Camera (of which I now own..... 25?), and thus began a serious obsession with photography. It brings me back to that innocent need to create analog images that still drives my work today.

I don't show my personal work much these days, since I am kept very busy with my Fine Art dog portraiture. But it's certainly a special treat to get to share another unique side of my photography. Here are a few favorite Polaroids from my trip: