Personal Projects are crucial in showing potential buyers how you think creatively on your own. I am drawn to personal projects that have an interesting vision or show something I have never seen before. In this revised column, I’ll include a link to each personal project with the artist statement so you can see more of the project. Please note: projects are found and submissions are not accepted.

This week’s Photographer: Steven Laxton

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Cypress Hills Brooklyn

I recently bought my first house. It was a grueling ordeal but well worth it because now I call Cypress Hills, Brooklyn, my home.

In the short time I’ve lived in this vibrant, multi-cultural neighborhood it has inspired me to create a new series of work.

This community welcomed me immediately. It feels like a small town where everyone knows your name even though there are 10 nationalities represented in 12 houses on my small block alone. It feels the way areas of downtown Manhattan did when I first arrived in New York: the melting pot that makes this city unique.

I love what I have found here, even though I worry about what it might mean that I am here. The Cypress Hills of today is going to change and I am part of that change, just as those who moved here 20 years ago were a part of a different kind of change. Whilst I love the community as it is, I am conscious of how the next 20 years might change it again.

Because of that, I am driven to document the community as it is now. New York is a city that is forever evolving, and I want to preserve this moment by celebrating the people that make Cypress Hills what it is today.

Over the summer I set up a portable studio in Highland Park where the locals come to play sport, picnic and escape the city hustle and bustle and heat I asked those I met to sit for a quick portrait. These are the many diverse faces of Cypress Hills.

http://www.ba-reps.com/photographers/steven-laxton/cypress-hills

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APE contributor Suzanne Sease currently works as a consultant for photographers and illustrators around the world. She has been involved in the photography and illustration industry since the mid 80s. After establishing the art buying department at The Martin Agency, then working for Kaplan-Thaler, Capital One, Best Buy and numerous smaller agencies and companies, she decided to be a consultant in 1999. She has a new Twitter feed with helpful marketing information because she believes that marketing should be driven by brand and not by specialty. Follow her at @SuzanneSease.

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