When I first created Fort Vanity at 18, it was a place to home all my images. My Dad was always saying, “Make it about ALL that you love!”
It took me all of 8 years to finally listen. So, welcome to all that I love, that I can’t help but do, and that I pray helps you see this life in new light.
With Hope,
Matthew W. Kennelly
Ralph Gibson, an award-winning photographer best known for his photography books, once said about Kennelly’s work on In The Blood, “There is no other work on a family farm as intimate, warm, and human as this work.” Kennelly had his first solo exhibition at 24, photographed the USA National Games Special Olympics, won Leica Akademie's photo contest, was featured in LHSA's ViewfinderMagazine, was accepted into Magnum Photo's Matt Black workshop, and was interviewed on the Real Food Real People podcast.
Kennelly, on his way to his first book, has written pieces for his local newspaper as well as Kindred Magazine. A self proclaimed documentarian of faults and glories, Kennelly hopes for all his work to break the barrier between stranger and friend, despair and hope, fantasy and reality. Empathy and honesty are the driving forces behind his work. He resides in Edmonds with his dog working on various projects while helping at his family’s music store and going to school for a degree in Social Work.
“Matt is an extremely talented photographer whose body of work can stand confidently next to some of the greats including Henri Cartier-Bresson and Bruce Gilden. He has an incredible ability to capture moments that will last a lifetime. His passion and desire to always be pushing himself creatively is a valuable asset that will no doubt fast-track his rise within the industry. Having known him personally for many years...he’s also a good person and a pleasure to collaborate with.”
“I have been watching Matthew’s work for some time and have found his ability to capture a very real human moment fused with a deft sense of composition to be reminiscent of the great documentary photographers of the WPA - leaving the viewer with the feeling of being witness to something on the verge of disappearing.”
“[Kennelly] has an uncanny eye for capturing people in a way that is profoundly affecting—- he somehow gets their stories, their movement, their faults and glories all crammed into a single shot. [...] He has the understated grace of a seasoned photographer, hanging back, unnoticed, getting all the real shots without disrupting the scene.”
“Like music that captures in the listener, Kennelly brings us to that pensive but comfortable space where our own raw reality is somehow safely revealed. His work connects directly, hinting how you are not alone in your thoughts anymore; rendering your own shitty memories or unexplainable feelings powerless to keep you isolated any longer. And that’s his magic: Kennelly’s work exhumes you, your own raw self, to a space where you get to heal, to feel, or to bury it again. Either way, you’ll always know that someone knew that part of you. I think that’s why his work is so strangely healing. It lets you belong.”