Every day is a chance to Begin again. With a Beginner’s mind, the expert becomes the student, open to the potentialities and possibilities that get buried in the ego of knowing. To become a Beginner, one learns to remain curious about the beautiful mundanity of life. One’s surroundings, routines, and daily lived experiences become opportunities to engage deeper with essential questions circulating the creative practice, including:

Who am I? What story do I want to tell?
How can I serve my personal mission?

Statement & Values

Collective Statement: Begin Collective creates accessible opportunities for creative exploration and community-building through photography and storytelling. We support people whose experiences are often excluded from mainstream representation ( people at the intersection of LGBTQ+, non-binary identity, and chronic illness, disability, and neurodiversity) offering tools, collaboration, and space to create narrative work rooted in lived experience.

Our Approach

Starting a creative project can feel tedious, intimidating, and overwhelming. Begin Collective supports participants in beginning this process through small, community-driven, self-directed programs that are financially accessible and open to interpretation.

We provide tools and guidance to help participants develop and complete independent bodies of narrative work within a collective framework. Participants are selected through open calls and nominations.

Building Community Through Photography

As Begin Collective grows, we continue creating opportunities for individuals to engage in photo-based projects, build community, and better understand the role of context in contemporary art practices.

We imagine photography as a shared space for storytelling, collaboration, and belonging.

Expanding What Photography Can Be

Begin Collective challenges traditional standards of photography and explores what the medium can become. We publish work through online galleries and embrace tools such as cameras with fixed settings to prioritize access, experimentation, and immediacy.

Through discussion and collaborative inquiry, we engage critical questions about the photographic canon and amplify stories that have been misrepresented, excluded, or erased.

Centering Underrepresented Narratives

We prioritize participation from BIPOC, queer, and non-normative communities, supporting work rooted in lived experience and self-representation.

Embracing Analog & Imperfect Aesthetics

We challenge conventional image-production traditions by embracing modes of making that honor:

  • grit

  • texture and imperfection

  • the accidental

  • immediacy

  • embodied presence

  • the expressive potential of analog processes

Impact

Begin Collective’s Austin, Texas pilot and following two sessions (2021–2022) served 18 participants through our free, community-based photography program centered on self-representation and collaborative image-making. The resulting exhibition at Austin’s Dougherty Arts Center (2023) drew hundreds of visitors, expanding public engagement with participant narratives and fostering meaningful dialogue around visibility, authorship, and lived experience. The exhibition also received a positive published review, extending the reach of participants’ work beyond the gallery and affirming the cultural relevance of participants’ stories.

Building on this foundation, Begin Collective will expand programming in Iowa and Maine in summer 2026. These sessions will provide accessible opportunities for new participants to create self-representative photographic work while strengthening regional networks of care, collaboration, and creative exchange. Public exhibitions and online galleries will extend the reach of participant narratives, fostering broader community engagement and continuing our commitment to amplifying stories that are often underrepresented in contemporary image culture.