Kaya- Coming of age

In June I was fortunate enough to be asked to photograph a beautiful girls Quinceanera, Kaya thanks to my friend connecting us- thanks Z. Kaya's family , especially parents , Claudia and Vinnie really made it a special day for her full of art from artist doing personal pieces for Kaya, music and so much more. They are very talented artist themselves and rooted ( check out their website www.indigenouswear.com or their facebook ). It was a pleasure to have spent some time with them, although it was a very full day I hope that I was able to capture at least a part of what the day was for them. We did do some shots around town prior to the event so I could get to know Kaya and her family. I was reminded of how it is to be a teenage girl coming of age , but surely a different time and space. I sound like my elders back in the day telling us about how times were different for them. With the experiences that I have had, I surely can see that in many ways the same things I dealt with as a youth. Many are so different....technology, social networks, etc. etc. My social network when I was her age was going outside and hanging out with my friends, yeah not always staying out of trouble, talking on the land line phone that had a 10 feet or more cord to move around the house to a little corner in the room for privacy, rarely in the house, oh my I better stop now. I am not trying to get on my soap box about society and what it has done to our children of the world (including me), but I hope that somewhere down the line that we as a people can in some way show the children of the world the beauty of life through art, music, creativity , education , culture and love. To Claudia and Vinnie, I do applaud you for having your children surrounded by art , culture and love.