Jess LeClair Photography Blog

Last week I was thrilled to photograph the 3rd annual Stache Pag. This is the second year I’ve photographed the event and all I can say is it just keeps getting better! The mustaches were out in force and there was some very stiff competition this year. In addition to being a super cool event, the proceeds went to support the Maine Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts ( MEVLA ). For more info, you can check out that very worthy organization here. As always, the event was presented by the very awesome folks at No Umbrella Media. You can visit the official Stache Pag site here. But what you should really do is head over to flickr and check out MY photos of the event.

Here are a few tastes:

If you would like to order prints of any of the photos you see here or on flickr, simply go over to www.jessleclair.printroom.com and click on the Stache Pag 2010 link at the bottom of the page. Enjoy!

Here is the second public show I’ll be in this season:

I will be sharing a table with the lovely Diane Brakeley of Della Mano Designs (who also happens to be my mom!).

I hope to see you all there!

It’s hard to believe it, but the holidays are here again.  And whatever your particular reason for celebrating, most likely you are going to need gifts galore for the special people in your life.  So come buy my stuff!  I will be in several craft shows this year and the first of the season is only a week away!

Its the first annual Craft Fix! in Kittery, Maine. I will be there from 10 AM to 6 PM and will be selling not only my lovely line of greeting cards (some of which can be found on my etsy site here) but some new products as well! There will be pinback buttons in a variety of styles, magnets made from vintage buttons, flowers made from more vintage buttons, some lovely little baby body suits (yes, they are “onesies” but legally, I can’t call them that. Ask Gerber why.) and a few other goodies you’ll have to come see for yourself! So come support your local economy (and me!) and get some really cool and unique things for your friends and family this year!

I am pleased to announce the official opening of my online Etsy shop!

Check it out: Jess LeClair Photography on Etsy.

There you will find greeting cards, buttons, and prints from my some of my favorite photographs (well, you’ll find those soon - I haven’t finished uploading all my goodies yet!  Keep checking back for more good stuff!)

For those of you who aren’t familiar with Etsy, here is the About Us section from their site:

Etsy is an online marketplace for buying & selling all things handmade.
Our mission is to enable people to make a living making things, and to reconnect makers with buyers.
Our vision is to build a new economy and present a better choice.
Buy, Sell, and Live Handmade.

As I mentioned before, there are only a hand full of items listed at the moment, but keep checking back! I’ll be updating constantly. And if there is something of mine you are interested in, but don’t see up in the shop, let me know! I’d be happy to do a special order just for you!

I’d also like to add a small personal note at the end here.  I just wanted to say thanks for all the amazing support this year folks.  Its been a tough year all around and I am grateful to have so many wonderful people supporting me and my business.  I really appreciate it!  So I hope you all have a wonderful holiday, whatever you celebrate, and take my warm thoughts with you as you visit family and friends.

So here is another in the very long list of why I love what I do: Kids + Music + a chance to dance and be silly = So Much Fun. I got to photograph a Music Together class in Belfast taught by the lovely and talented Laura Donnelly. She is one of those people you just want to know and be around even when she is not singing and dancing. For once, I never had to even think about how to get these kids to smile - they were having so much fun, they couldn’t STOP smiling! Photographing events like this can barely be called work for me. It was hard not to join in and sing along!

I was lucky enough my freshman year at Brown University to be hired by the Theater Department as their Staff Photographer. It was quite the accomplishment. Little 18 year old me beat out 5 other candidates for the job. Our job interview was that we all had to photograph the same dress rehearsal and then they looked at the pictures we’d taken and gave the job to the one they liked best. It was more than a little nerve wracking.

Colored Museum, 1996

That job was easily one of my very favorites EVER. I was paid to photograph all the publicity stills for the newspapers and then I would come in during the final dress rehearsal and photograph the whole show for the lobby photos and for the theater archives (and what ever else they might need them for - newsletters, programs, posters etc.). It meant I got to see every single show put on by the two main stage theaters at Brown all four years I was there. Plus I got extra free tickets if I wanted to take other people with me once the show officially opened. Because of that job, my work was published in 11 different Rhode Island and Massachusetts newspapers and publications (under my maiden name, Brakeley, of course). Not bad for a college kid!

Arcadia, 1996.

Our Country’s Good, 1997

Las Meninas, 1997

Keep in mind, I was shooting with plain old Kodak color film and a little Minolta SRT101 (from the 70s). No digital, no retouching, no flash even. Just what ever came out of my camera. I didn’t even have a zoom lens! I was forever jumping up and over the empty seats in the theater and zooming up and down the aisle to get closer or farther away from the stage.

Sweeney Todd, 1998

This was one of the publicity stills for The Bacchae that was published in the Brown Daily Herald in the spring of 1998. They had this deeply annoying habit of not publishing my name, just saying “courtesy Leeds Theater” even though the theater always gave them my name with the photo. Whatever.

This is a page from The Independent, another local Providence paper. The show was Cymbeline, 1998.

Camino Real, 1998

A Flea in Her Ear, 1999

Passion Play, 1999

Artistic Licence, 1999

Marisol, 2000

Spring Dance Concert, 1998


I also photographed the dance concerts held each spring on the main stage. Dance is next to impossible to photograph if you haven’t seen it before. It was one of the few things I would ask to come in for the pre-dress rehearsal just so I could see what was coming. With theater, at least you can have an idea of what is going on and where people are going to be by what they are saying. But dance is all movement and no words! Its impossible to guess when something truly photographable is about to happen!

Spring Dance Concert, 2000