We got Greg Davis here on the establishing your empire podcast. Thank you for so much for being here today. Got the new office set up. So this took a little bit of finagling to get it going, but  really appreciate you being here

Greg Davis: [00:03:39] honored to be the first time in the office.

Daran Herrman: That’s right.  So why don’t we start and just give us a little background of who you are and what you do.

Greg Davis: Yeah. I  currently at this moment in my life, I’ve enjoyed this break in the pandemic. Take some time off new homeowner out in outside of Austin.  Come from a nice family from east Texas. Same hometown for, we’ve been in that town for a little over a hundred years. So it’s  some heritage there.  What I currently do for work and we’ll get to that.

I have a pretty interesting life over the last 15 years. I’ve made my sole income as a working photographer and selling art as a, as my offering. I mean, I offer things like these beautiful pieces that you have behind you.  It’s taken me all over the world  all of the United States to show and share the work and then also shooting in different remote parts of the world.

So it’s been quite an venture.

Daran Herrman: [00:04:28] So 15 years ago you got into photography?

Greg Davis: [00:04:30] Yeah. I was a tech guy before that. And how did, how did you start that crazy part of this whole story? So I  I’ll start back in the beginning. I grew up in a small town in east, Texas. And  my great grandfather came over  the horse and buggy and the east Texas, and opened up a dry goods store on the corner of two dirt roads in a town called Livingston, Texas, about an hour north of Houston, big pine trees, lumber, you know  that was really the main focus of the area in the beginning.

 But people needed the dry goods. So we’ve still got the receipts from the family store from way back when  that was in 19. Oh, I think it was 1904 is when they started  my great-grandfather and his brother. And then that was passed. My grandfather passed to my dad and then  I was about to graduate away from high school.

I graduated in 87. I was the high school newspaper photographer. My dad had an old E one camera and  I thought grab the 81 and see what happens. It was an excuse to take pictures of the girls first off. So I, I  I grabbed the 81. It was filmed days, had the dark room. And there was nothing in that early work that really said this.

Kid’s got it right. That asked me, what do you want to do, son? I said  art school. I said, no, no, no. So what do you want to do? I said, I don’t know, what do you want me to do, dad? He said, I want you to go to business school, get your Baylor business degree.  He had gone to Baylor. His dad had gone to Baylor and their mother, great grandmother.

My great grandmother had gone to Baylor. So I bleed green and gold.  Went to Baylor, put down the camera.  Didn’t really take any photographs. This was, you know, in the early nineties, late eighties, early nineties. And  after graduation, I got in to the tech world, early tech and  you know, 15 years later I woke up with Dell and Compaq, HP slinging hardware.

And  this was late nineties into the early two thousands. And  At around that time, I was around 30 to 35 years old. I’m 52 now, but about 30 to 35. And I kind of went through a personal valley of darkness. Okay. This is not a light story, but this is what happened. Th the ending is nice because I came out of it.

 Unscaved if you will, I probably scarred a little bit, but I lost six family members died in a very short amount of time.  Probably about five years was about five of them. My dad included my grandmother, my dad, my cousin, aunt, uncle, and then ultimately another two cousins. And  I was attacked by a gang.

I’ve got 40 stitches in my head and neck from a violent gang attack, a bottle over the back of the head.  It was an initiation. It was unprovoked. I didn’t have anything to do with it really. I was just the target, but was attacked from behind. And then when I was on the ground was beat and fortunately got away  was able to fight or flight kicked in big time.

And I was able to scramble and get away from the situation.  More to the sort of the pits that I was in. I lost all of my nest egg and a bad financial move, which was a significant amount of money. Cause I’d been in tech for, you know, at that point for, at that point, probably a decade. And  and then I had a love of a girlfriend.

I was with that I love dearly that, you know, did, did her thing behind my back. And so I was brokenhearted. I was beat. I was battered. Yeah, literally. Yeah. And I was in a really, really bad place.  It was not  it was not healthy, you know, mentally.  Do, did

Daran Herrman: [00:08:06] you have any imbalance of the depression

Greg Davis: [00:08:08] at that?

Oh yeah. Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah. I was out verifiably.  And I was drinking and I was drinking pretty heavily. And I wasn’t a friendly guy when  when it got to a point, I had a lot of insecurities. I had a lot of anger issues.  I didn’t trust any body, get interested, anything I didn’t trust God everybody’s dying.

I didn’t trust the system. It had stolen from me. I didn’t trust women. I’d been cheated on, I didn’t trust other people cause I’d been attacked. Anything, you know? Like how can you live a happy life without trust? I mean, I, to me, you have to trust that in something that’s greater and other people, you know, I and your partner for sure.

Daran Herrman: [00:08:51] And I think a lot of people in the past year, maybe not all of those items, but a number of those have had. So tough times dealing with everything, especially when you’re, you took away some things like human interaction and they family members, loss, disinformation, everywhere, not trusting information coming out.

Greg Davis: [00:09:11] And the unknown of not knowing what’s going to happen through all of this right

Daran Herrman: [00:09:17] on drinking. Right on top of it, just a little bit multiplier

Greg Davis: [00:09:20] there, drugs, right? There’s been probably some, some heavy lifting for people through this past year and a half.  So my, my heart goes out to people. I certainly know what it feels like to be in a very challenging place and there is help out there.

And I highly recommend talking to somebody about it.  I saw therapists back then  after the attack, really when that happened, that really kind of got me going a wrong direction, but the therapist was extremely beneficial.  He highly recommended that I quit drinking. And  and, and I, I call them God winks, serendipity and the synchronicity and the things in our lives line up that are sometimes hard to explain  wow.

Hard to explain. Like I’m like, whoa, what just happened? You know, and trying to piece it together. How did that come about? Well, totally random.  This therapist  had a really good conversation with these dudes dude. And  during one of our conversations, he stood up and he said, yeah, I’m Mike. And I’m an alcoholic.

He goes, let me tell you a story. And this was Intuit about maybe a month. He said I was in a bar when I was, I forget how old he was at the time 26, maybe I was in a bar and a bar fight broke out. And I wasn’t necessarily the intended target, but I got a bottle over my head. Right. And this is, this is the guy that I’m went in for the thing.

And I was like, are you kidding? You’re kidding me. Right? Like he’s no, I was in a, oh no, it was his throat. That’s what it was. I got it. Wasn’t a, it was, it wasn’t the back of the head that he, it was, it slit his throat and Mrs. Jones. Wow. Yeah. So he said I haven’t had a drink since that day. I knew that my life wasn’t, I was in the wrong place with the wrong people.

And that was it. So I thought, how in the world am I coming in to talk about this? And this guy’s had the same thing he said, I recommend that you quit. I can try it. So when tooth Africa, the years now, I think it’s 2003. That was the beginning of 2004. Quit drinking.  And the God winks started even more.

The serendipity, the synchronicity, I, you know, I, there was one point in all of that debt, then that depth I rolled out of my bed. I was living in Colorado Springs at the time. And a lot of people asked me about like, where were you when it happened? You know, what happened happened? And I can share the short story and you say, I say Colorado Springs.

And they’re like, what? But if you really think about I 25 as a corridor for the drug cartels right out of Mexico, right through El Paso, right up to Albuquerque, right up through Pueblo, right up through Trinidad, right into Colorado Springs, right up to Denver, boom, you know, distribution, the central United States.

And there are, I learned there are, you know, there’s presence in each of these cities for the cargo that’s coming through, you know, and there’s communication. Hey, the cargo made it through because there’s probably a big money involved. And the, in Colorado Springs there’s presence of people. Are working

Daran Herrman: [00:12:37] might be a smaller presence, but it’s still there.

Right? I think in a lot of cities, like even Austin, you almost have to look for trouble, but there’s still trouble

Greg Davis: [00:12:45] for sure. It’s it I’ve been here 25 years now. So I’ve seen a bit of a change. It’s got some big city problems and then you start to witness that stuff on the streets more to just some, you know, monkey business going on and people doing things, you know, that this doesn’t feel right.

Yeah. I’ve had some really interesting things with downtown Austin over the last five years. Just it’s changing, it’s changing. It’s still an amazing place.  It’s a big city problems are coming in here, but still want to quit drinking. So quit drinking. And then these, these coincidences and, oh, let me go back to that night that I had truly hit rock bottom and I was in bed probably three o’clock in the morning and I rolled out of bed and it was almost out of body.

I remember rolling out and just was just at the bottom and was sort of afraid. Where, where I was, you know, like mentally, I like wherever you are, whoever you are. You’ve got to come down here. You’ve got to help me. I need guidance. I need, I can’t take any more pain. You know, I just had had it. And  the proverbial lightning struck  I quit drinking soon after that.

And  these, these things started happening. I was like, wow. You know, and I’d ask for this, these, these messages I’d ask for, for help. I’d ask for change. You know, how did that, how did it show up? For me, it showed up in these coincidence is this the serendipity that showed up in my life and I started embracing them as language.

 And that led me to sell it all the real th the last big one was  out of the BLUF two friends of mine. Call me a couple and. And this was, as, as things I had, I was pretty much getting close to making the decision. And then when they called and said, Hey, we’re going around the world for a year. You have any interest in going with us.

I was like, I hadn’t talked to them in years. I was like, are you kidding me?  I mean, you know, let’s go. So this was oh five. This was like summer of five. No, no, sorry. Summer of four, I got back some real five.  And that was all I needed to hear. That was it. You know, I didn’t want to necessarily go off by myself.

I do now. And it’s fine, but for some reason just where I was and post 9 1 1, and, you know, I just was like, it’s a little bit sheltered, but at some point you gotta, you know, just throw off the bow line and go for the adventure. Well, and they gave you a little

Daran Herrman: [00:15:02] push and a lot of my, I haven’t been a big push is that it doesn’t sound like, but they gave you that little less.

Like, and it didn’t sound like you, it sounded like you were ready and didn’t have a lot of excuses not to go. Like, I’m sure you could come up with them, but  You know, and sometimes we just need something, a little exciting to sh to jumble things a little bit  you know, I don’t have near as cool story, but I’ll just small for me is I always want to move and I came to Austin and it was great.

It was fin it’s like there was perfect weather and this and that. And I was finally like, all right, like how long have you been here? Since 2008. Okay, cool. So I’ve been here for bet. 

Greg Davis: [00:15:36] seen a lot of change.

Daran Herrman: [00:15:38] The downtown skyline is a little different, but you know, and then  and I had a buddy that I had one friend move here.

That’s all I needed. I think was just one little light, itty bitty. I’d move out a job, nothing like that. But I had a couch to sleep on for a week or two until I figured it out. Right.  And it’s, you know, looking back, you’re like, that’s, that’s it, that’s all that made you push.

Greg Davis: [00:15:59] Yeah. Right. Yeah. And if we’re open to change, all we need is that spark and trust.

It goes back to trust. Right. I mean, Hey, you know, I trusted, wow, you’re calling, you know, this is, this is it. And so where’d, you guys go. So I S I, you know, now I’m going to cut back to 1987. I was the high school newspaper photographer. Right. But I hadn’t photographed really up until a little bit. Yeah. You know, and before that trip, not much.

So I was like, okay, it was shopping for a camera. I didn’t want to take a big, fancy, expensive camera. I wasn’t into cameras. I wasn’t even shooting. A lot of photos is obviously pre this, you know, so not everybody was carrying a camera around. And so I went and bought an Olympus C7 50 point and shoot, I think it’s 4.5 megapixel camera.

It had a nice zoom, you know, it all, you know, I had probably $400 camera. That’s all I thought about it. I thought I’m going to take some photographs. I set up a little bitty website. This was oh four. So, you know, no social media, let’s get a little website just so I can have a way to communicate with family and friends.

This would be the way that I’d communicate. And then. W plan on writing some stories so that I could bring people in that knew me, just share my experience with them. You know, it sounds crazy now, but oh four, that was sort of a different world back then. And I thought I’ll set up a little store too, and we’ll maybe sell a few prints and that’ll help help with this.

Help me around the world, you know, and plan was to go for a year and  I’ll cut ahead a little bit, got home and had sold $500 worth of photos. And I thought, oh, that that’s not going to work for $500 in a year. You know? So when I got home, I wasn’t thinking that what was going to happen was going to happen, but I’ll cut back to the tree,

Daran Herrman: [00:17:43] sell a couple of prints.

So $500

Greg Davis: [00:17:45] to family and friends to

Daran Herrman: [00:17:48] charity. Yeah. It’s family, friends. I didn’t have, I can’t, I don’t, I feel bad giving you money, but I’ll buy a print. I’ll trade

Greg Davis: [00:17:57] you, trade you yourself. Yeah. So I didn’t have a lot of confidence when I got home, but there’s an interesting story about how things sort of changed  regarding all that.

And again, that’s lessons, you know, in there that it may not look like something, you know, but, but the little push, but the little putting yourself out there, a little courage or this or that, you know, I mean, things can, can move on you in different directions, but you gotta have some action. You know, I think you gotta move.

We started  in Turkey and  we ended up going through  through Africa, over into Asia  down into Australia and south Pacific and then back home, just chock full of beautiful, amazing situations. And also to be fair, some downtime, some loneliness, some what the hell am I doing here?

Daran Herrman: [00:18:45] Traveling like that.

And, and, and being with a couple that was a couple too. So that’s, that’s tough seeing them having a good time and stuff. They

Greg Davis: [00:18:52] got their little thing, you know? Yeah.  Did that increase your trust in people seeing such different variety of people? Yeah. I

think one of the main reasons is for even going, was this trust that I didn’t have before or for something greater for people, for women, for the system, all this stuff I’d lost.

And, you know, I was looking to reconnect to that. I was looking to reconnect to people, regain my trust in people and women in the system and God, and  and having to take, having to approach them one that you’re attracted to and not in any sexual way. Well, I just there’s, we have attraction to people.

There’s something in that person that we recognize there’s an old soul in there that we’ve come across or whatever it is. We’re drawn to certain people in certain for certain reasons. And  these people that I was drawn to, I would have to approach them to photograph them. And it’s not always the easiest thing to do.

Not at all. You have to be extremely authentic and vulnerable to get the kind of work that I, that I shoot now. I mean, you really have to put yourself out there and it’s gotta be coming from the right place or the footage, photographs not going to come off. Well, you know, why are you making this photograph and what is it about this person and what can I give back without throwing a bunch of dollar bills at a person that I don’t, I don’t like this, this idea.

I’ve seen it turn bad in some places where now the people are expecting it and there’s even gets to a point where they demand it and then it gets, it’s very inauthentic thing, but I like to travel with a small printer and I’ll give them, or I’ll take a Polaroid and I’ll give them a Polaroid, love that idea

Daran Herrman: [00:20:31] of a little swell printer.

Cause I’ve, I’ve gone around and you get this really cool photo and you show them and they’re like, oh, that’s me. You know? And then I’m gone and it’s gone, I’m gone and they’re gone. And the whole thing. And then  what I do want to say there, and I think we’re going to have a little theme here of this is trust.

 You know, I think I’ve always known it without actually saying it out loud or thinking it directly is it’s a massive trust thing when it, when you’re taking the photos, people, even in people who know what, you know, have had their photo taken a thousand times, all this, even this. Yeah. Correct.

Completely gnarly. Yeah. And we like, even for me, like I was saying before we jumped on. Yeah, I do the filming thing and all that. And I think that is so people would trust me with a good product. They see other things to do a nice website, doing all the things because I’m, you know, you know, almost asking for the trust of it.

But then  the secondary piece is  hoping that they trust to open up as you are, which I do really appreciate. And it’s super interesting already, and we just started.  But yeah, I think there’s a big piece there   of photography. And I’m going to be thinking about this later today and probably for a while.

 Cause I just did a shoot yesterday and you know, people, even people that are out there self-promoting can get really. It’s hard with a big camera in front of their face, you know  they can really clam up unless you kind of can get them to open up for you and be

Greg Davis: [00:21:59] themselves. Right. Well, you did a good job of that.

And you know, me knowing what I’m walking into and knowing this re these rigs and all that, but like, you know, talking, talking me through, just making me comfortable in your home here, you know, getting some water, showing me around the place, you know, I mean, gaining trust through just basic being authentic and conversational and sharing what you have.

 That’s a big part of sort of gaining that trust. Sure. Without it, you know, you walk in and it’s okay. I do what you put me at ease. So hats off, you know what I mean? And that’s part of, of  any kind of photography and video videography work is making the subject at ease. You know,

Daran Herrman: [00:22:41] I’ve been on the other side of the podcast  being in your shoes and that’s a little interesting sometimes, you know, so maybe that that’s helpful, but yeah,

Greg Davis: [00:22:50] well, I, I don’t make it, here’s my deal.

I don’t make any plans. I just come in here and whatever comes out of me through that, into you guys. Thanks for listening. You know, I  there’s no plan here. There’s no agenda for me. It’s just sharing the, the, the story behind how I got here and that’s all I can do, you know, and my work is my work and it, you know, it’s, it speaks to people or it doesn’t and that’s okay.

 I don’t  I don’t have a, a real agenda. I do like sharing my story though. I think it can be inspiring for people, some not and some soaps. So I think

Daran Herrman: [00:23:27] one of the big things  sorry to interject, but is, is a lot of people want to become a photographer and replace the word photographer with a lot of things.

It’s interesting that, you know, a lot of people have been in the corporate world. Like you have been  have been super depressed, especially at this pre previous year and a half. So I think  it’s  great to understand how we can go from one end to the other. And so to get back to the story, so you travel, you come back and they like, okay.

Greg Davis: [00:23:53] I

Daran Herrman: [00:23:53] used to be making all this money. I made $500 and spent way more than that. Yeah.

Greg Davis: [00:23:58] So what’d you do? So I had, so I didn’t after I lost, because I lost a lot of, I lost my nest egg in a bad financial move before I left. Right. And so I had, and I don’t mind sharing this. I mean, I had some stuff that was, I’ve never touched, but I had about $17,000.

Th to my name. I mean, I had a little bit more of just safety net stuff, but at 17 that I could kind of get to and it didn’t have much. Okay. I have much before the bad financial move I had enough, but you know, I was like, you know what? I can’t take anymore. I’m out, man. I can’t, I was just like, I can’t take.

And then also it’s done, I’m off, taken off. I spent 17, I spent it all 17,500 on that trip, which is not a lot of money. Cause I was living really simply overseas and eating really simply. But that forced me into not forced as a bad word that engaged me in the communities know on the streets of India and in the mountain villages of Thailand or wherever it might be got away from the tourist scene.

 And even in oh four, it was just a different world, no Instagram and no social media. It just was a, it was a slower pace of travel. There was still travelers for sure. Can we cut. Cut to get back. I got back and Austin, 2005, you said, oh yeah. So yeah, it wasn’t that far off of a totally different world back then.

Right? I mean, downtown didn’t even feel like a big city. No, not at all dead zone down there back then. You couldn’t walk anywhere too. It was great. Yeah. No, Uber, I had to

Daran Herrman: [00:25:36] walk, trying to find a gap was the worst thing to do in the morning. They couldn’t find them. Yeah. It’s stuck

Greg Davis: [00:25:42] down there, dude. You gotta to come get me.

I can’t

Daran Herrman: [00:25:44] get a lock. I walked, I had apartment five and a half miles away. I walked on one night as I couldn’t, I couldn’t figure it out. There

Greg Davis: [00:25:50] was limited amount of calves and they were going to the airport anyways.

Daran Herrman: [00:25:53] It was busy and it was like, it’s hilarious. Cause it’s

Greg Davis: [00:25:56] just start walking. Yeah. But we can remember when it was that right.

And  It was quaint and cute. And it was, it seemed like it was more gel down there with some of the personalities probably cause I was hanging out there. I was working it. So I got back from the trip and some friends of mine that I grew up with in, in Livingston, Texas  Brad and Chad Womack, who Brad was the bachelor at one point.

So they hit it really big in the TV world and brought a lot of attention to them and their bars. The, the MTV people came into town and the chugging as a check  the dizzy rooster drew was the hangout for the MTV folks. And that was Brad and Chad’s bar. So they were just hitting on all cylinders with these guys.

And they had a bar over on I’m on a red river called it’s the most now. And it was called the velvet spade. So I contacted them and said, Hey, I’m back from this trip around the world. And I don’t want to go back to corporate America.  I’ve never bartended. You got a bar because they were opening new bars every week.

It seemed like, and they said, yeah, we got one on red river that were just start and you can go over there and sling some drinks for us. And cool. So I was there and  of course, talking to people well at the bar, you know, before it really got, you know, busy the bar, you had a few hours there, kind of the regulars that would come in and shoot the breeze.

And I got to talking about, oh, you just got back from this trip and, you know, kind of talking to people. And I talked about it enough to where one of the, one of the brothers or the youngest brother, I said, why don’t you hang up some of your pictures in the bar here, you know, and be cool. And I was like, okay, I don’t even know how to do that, but I’m telling you embarrassed to even say, but went to Costco and printed them and went to Walmart and got some frames.

I’m mortified now that, but Hey, I didn’t know. And I certainly didn’t have any money to custom frame and printed on museum rag and all the stuff that I do now, but I printed up a dozen photos and stuck them on the wall. It developed speed. And about a weekend, someone stole the one that was closest to the door.

Right. I thought, you know, if they’re good enough to steal, maybe, maybe there’s something else there. Oh, no.  I’d love to meet the person who stole it and like just them, not just laugh, you know? Cause it really did like, wow. Hmm. And then I met a girl  I was dating her and we were walking down west sixth street and back then west sixth street.

There was, that was  the little Irish pub that was down there.   Mother Egan’s. Yeah, there’s just a couple of a couple right. Or right next to mother Egan’s was a little blank, little open parking lot. They’re still there actually surprisingly, but it was an art market. Like the kinda like the ones they have on down on south Lamar  south Congress and the girl she elbows me and says, Hey, why don’t you go in there and see what’s what’s that.

Because she had seen my photos and was like, oh wow, these are amazing. I have, thank you, honey. You’re supposed to say that just no, seriously, go in there and check it out. So I went in and I said, Hey, who runs this outfit? What’s this is this an art, like an app. If I have some things I want to offer, I think I was like, yeah, go back there.

The guy named with goatee named Wayne, go talk to Wayne. So I went back and talked to Wayne. I said, Hey, Wayne, I’m I’m Greg Davis. And  my girlfriend, Christine, that she says, I’ve got some photos that might do well in a place like this. How does this work? You know? And he said, well  we’ll set you up 10 the first time you do it, I’ll set you up a tent and we’ll get you some walls.

And it’s $25 a day to do it. And I looked at her and I was like, twenty-five bucks a day. Why not try it? And already had the work. I already knew kind of like how to print and frame them cheap at that point because of the, cause the bar work. And so he said, well, just do that next weekend, come back and give us a, give us a try and see what you got.

So I went and went back to Costco and Walmart whisper that.  And then these are still the same travel photos.

This is from that one year. That’s when that, yeah, this was just a few months after I’d gotten back from this one-year trip. So yeah, this is still the original from that little Olympus point and shoot.

So, I mean, I literally had to go through the little website that I had set up for myself and was like looking through them and going, okay. Which one of these do I print now that I’ve got this opportunity to, to show?

Daran Herrman: [00:30:12] So how did the first day go at

Greg Davis: [00:30:14] the art market? Yeah, so I went and printed them, framed him.

 He had the walls, he had the tent  came out there, backed in the truck, you know, and hung, hung the little, had little hooks. I’d made little business cards and  you have like 20 prints, something, 10 prints. I haven’t, you know, I’m glad I did it. I took a photograph. Of my very first day, because I speak, like I speak to at university of Texas and to some schools and  some groups and things like that.

And I always bring that in as part of the, the story, which is because now my work is big and it’s like, you know, I got my own studio and it’s big and bold. And back then it was, I call it my chicken coop days, you know, it was really simple, but

Daran Herrman: [00:30:58] that’s great foresight that you knew. I mean, you’re obviously a storyteller through, and through that, you knew that there was a story there, but yourself,

Greg Davis: [00:31:06] I guess the days

Daran Herrman: [00:31:07] where you just pulled out your phone and you had to like power on a little point and shoot or, well, you know,

Greg Davis: [00:31:13] that was part of the story too, was I took these photographs with that, you know, so I kinda thought, and you know what, I need to bring that with me.

I need to bring that with me. Cause that is kind of a thing. Cause it wasn’t a professional grade camera. It was a current camera, you know, but it wasn’t a professional grade camera and the photos. I we’re really nice, you know? And that’s from that, that camera  first day knew it. I knew, I knew this is what I supposed to do with my life cell.

Anything that first time did that 500 bucks, the next weekend I sold a thousand dollars. Really? I said

Daran Herrman: [00:31:43] little shops. I didn’t even know

Greg Davis: [00:31:45] people did well on those things. Yeah. So the next weekend, my second week, and I doubled my grant and I was like, wait a second. There’s 52 weeks in this year. And I just did a thousand bucks.

Okay. Yeah. I got cost of goods and blah, blah, blah, blah. I was like, I hadn’t even really tried yet. You know, so I, I got it. I got a shot at this, you know, immediately it was obvious and people were, you know, bad. I hate to keep using this reference, but Instagram was not around. So the world, even in oh four was a more closed place.

We didn’t have access to the imagery and the all that was. What I was seeing and bringing home and, and the spirit behind it to of course helps it. Wasn’t just a snapshot that was soul and spirit in the

Daran Herrman: [00:32:26] work out of that first    collection was your, which one did the best or which one was your

Greg Davis: [00:32:33] favorite?

And that’s a great question. Cause I didn’t know. Right. I went out to my little rinky-dink website and I pulled off, you know, selected the photos. Okay. I think this one’s good. I think that one, I mean, it was what I liked. Right. And then I’ve been out there probably three weeks, maybe a month. And there was a girl who came to the bar.

She was a regular name, Sarah. And  I’m trying to think how this story went. Cause I haven’t told it in so long. She came out. She actually, I knew her from the bar. She came to the, to the little market and said, ah, She came up to me. She goes, I don’t see it here, but I know the one that I want. And I was like, w which one?

She goes, the hands I go, what? She goes, the hands, the blue and the green hands. I was like, I had to think like, oh, wait a second. Okay. The Vietnam. So I had to go out to my own site and select the image that I hadn’t selected as the first edit, you know, or the first edit of what I was going to print. And I pulled it off and I printed a few extra just in case.

Cause I knew she wanted one. She came the next weekend. She got it. And those other two. So,

Daran Herrman: [00:33:41] so you, you shot that photo cause that’s, that’s still a big photo for you, right? Yeah. Yeah. And so you shot that on like a little pin tacks, a regular point

Greg Davis: [00:33:49] and shoot and Olympus.

Daran Herrman: [00:33:51] Yeah. Yeah. Back then. This is worth like 30 cents nowadays.

 Which is important because a lot of people think that you have to have this newest craziest, I mean, I shot with a 70 for a long time. Yeah. The phone nowadays is better than 90% of the stuff we used to use back then.  But the motivation, when you have a camera, you know, sometimes you’ll  there’s some benefits there to have a DSLR it’s gonna motivate you

Greg Davis: [00:34:14] and print in print.

You can print something small with this. Okay. But sure. I’m in, I’m in the print game, you know  equality Frank game.

Daran Herrman: [00:34:23] It’s still important that, you know yeah. You can get to where you are now with  you know, getting real expensive camera, but it doesn’t mean you have to start

Greg Davis: [00:34:32] with that. Absolutely. Yeah.

You don’t and you don’t have to print big in the beginning to make it work. I was, you know, my biggest was a 11 by 14 print and then I’d frame it to maybe 16 by 20 and you know, back then I maybe offer it for 250 bucks or something, you know, and I had probably 50 bucks in it, you know, and it was enough, you know  it was plenty.

I was starting a new thing, you know, and  I wasn’t even sure it was gonna work. I mean, I knew that people were really responding on an emotional level and that’s important. I think when you’re offering anything, is people need to feel connected to that thing that they are collecting or purchasing or.

Or whatever it is, or even if

Daran Herrman: [00:35:17] they’re just enjoying it, you know, it doesn’t have to be something that hang up on their, in their house. So, okay. You, you have that thousand dollar a day. You’re like, Hey, I’m going to full-time. So, and you’re selling some stuff. How did you move to the next step of like, okay, I’m going to be a photographer now, like I’m going to take more

Greg Davis: [00:35:34] photos.

Well, I, at that point I continued doing that and I kept hearing about, you know  these other larger, more regional  city run art festivals. And again, I’m going, going back to when I didn’t know anything. Right. So I was like, oh, the city’s an island come from art. I didn’t come from the, the, the market. I didn’t know anything about it.

When a lot of information there was no YouTube.  So yeah, every city has an annual. Large juried, Jerry Jerry means that the artists are selected, the artists apply, and then they have a professional jury normally run by a museum curator, local gallery owner, maybe the previous year’s best of show of that show.

The next year they’ll put up slides and they’ll select, you know, and they only select certain amount of artists and a certain amount of artists within category. So only, you know, 10 photographers out of 200 applications or something to keep the quality of the show high, not all shows are like this. The good ones that I like to do are  like to get in.

I don’t always get in them either, but the ones I like to do when I’m getting, when I get in. So I learned about these, these shows and I’m like, oh wow. Okay. And then I kept having people would come by my space in Austin at this little small art market. And they kept saying there’s a, well, a few times they were like, there’s a girl at the, at the Austin show, which is the big city show that I hadn’t.

No, I think I’ve been doing at that point, like six months. And that’s when the show was like, there’s a girl over there named Lisa, Christine she’s out of San Francisco and her work and your work have a really there’s something going on there, like similar yeah. Fives. And so I had to look her up and I was like, wow, that’s quite a compliment.

Cause Lisa, Christina was very, very talented.  And I kept hearing that over and over it still at this little art market, you know, even after that, after the big show in Austin had gone away and everybody for the weekend was over. But over the course of people had seen that work and they wouldn’t make their way to, and they’d go, your work reminds me of somebody.

I was like, Lisa, Christine. They’re like, that’s her how’d you know, that I was like, I keep hearing that over and over and over, you know? And she had been doing what she, she does for at least maybe a decade or more. So she was sort of this original inspiration of like, oh, wow, thanks for living as a photographer, offering her beautiful pieces, framed for, for homes, you know?

And  And then, you know, ultimately I got to a point where I was like, I  that’s my direction. I’m going to go that direction and start doing these shows, applying for these shows and yeah.

Daran Herrman: [00:38:01] And then  where was the next breaking point? Right. So you got it, you got a little bit of money so that you can actually, you know, pay your bills a little bit, but, but like where were we?

I think we’ve got a whole different couple levels until you’re today. So what was kind of another kind of big

Greg Davis: [00:38:19] piece? Yeah, that was, that was just starting to go from sort of this small time.  Art markets. Okay. Now I’m starting to do regional, you know, of course the one in Austin, Houston has the Bayou city arts festival Fort worth main street, the massive show, 300,000 people go to it and there’s money in Fort worth and they collect art.

They’ve got a great thing going in Fort worth with Ayman Carter, with Kimball. They got a better art scene in Fort worth. And then we’ve got here in Austin, add people are going to kill me to say that, but from a museum standpoint, oh, well, that’s not necessarily from the art standpoint. I don’t want to make that comparison because there’s great art in both, but from a purely  museum standpoint, you know, I think it’s a deeper, deeper roots there, Austin.

Austin’s way better than it’s been. Right. But there was a time in Austin, but really struggled  with bringing in proper museums. But it’s it’s yeah. It’s, it’s way better than it. Well it’s and it’ll continue to get better with funding and people focusing on it and  before it was, yeah, that’s a great show then you’ve got, I mean the walkie has their museum amazing architectural museum looks like a bird.

This opens and closes. Not, not over time. Just it opens sometimes when the winds are right before. Architectural building Chicago old town is a great show. So you have these really highly juried shows and it takes a particular type of artists to do these types of shows. Not all artists want to do it cause it’s extremely difficult.

You’re at the mercy of the weather. You’re at the mercy of people. Hmm. Anybody can say anything they want and anybody can, you know, so it’s not for everybody. It’s a very difficult way to make a living.  But offering art is it’s just a challenge to do it, but it’s extremely rewarding and I wouldn’t choose it any other way.

And I’ve been able to meet amazing people, travel all over the world, but it started from that little show to, to the regionals and then  more nationwide. And I think, I don’t, I don’t know if the big break, but it, maybe it was the big break. There’s been a lot of big breaks actually over time, but in 2010, I driven out to, to, to  west Texas out to Marfa to celebrate my birthday and my girlfriend at the time.

And I were coming back in 2010, right. We’re coming back and out in west, Texas, you know, you’re off the cellular network and you know, there’s a point where you hit snore maybe, or somewhere, but you hit cellular service and all of a sudden the phone starts going off. Right. And so my phone beeped a couple of times and things a couple of times, and I’m driving it straight away but said, Hey, could you check that?

And actually not to say what I did. I forget when I guess I looked down and saw it real quick. And it said, NG contract. And I handed it to Lauren, Lauren. I said, Hey, please read that for me. And she opened up the, the email and said, oh my God, pull the car over right now. We pulled the car over and dancing in the desert that night national geographic had contacted me and offered me  to be represented by their image collection, which is their agency and national geographic.

So I’ve been with them. There’s been a lot of changes recently with Disney buyout and the Fox buyout before that. And a lot of structural changes with nacho.  For 10 years I was represented by their image collection. So supporting content was sent to my editor there and just like huge. I mean, it made you and I met them.

 I don’t really ever know how it, it happened for sure, but  I think a lot of different things, but one thing that definitely happened was I was showing my work at the Armadillo Christmas Bazaar, which is a one of these art art  the festival things that happens during Christmas here in Austin, amazing heritage.

 The Armadillo has been going on 41 years.  There’s three bands a day, but I will

Daran Herrman: [00:42:05] ask is before, cause I’m a big believer that you can  increase the surface area of your luck by doing some stuff.  How many shows do you think you did before you landed the national geographic contract?

Greg Davis: [00:42:22] Yeah, so the, the, the way that went down was I was at the Armadillo and I’d been doing shows well, 2010, 2005 to 2010, so five, five years.

And I probably averaged 20 a year 20 shows. So I was a hundred over a hundred. Yeah. At least around there. And it happened that next door. And that was the year that the Armadillo was at the  at the convention center. They were between the Austin music hall and now where they are at the Palmer, but they were at the convention center and next door was a national geographic book cell.

They were getting rid of all their books from the year. Into your cell. And  someone from the organization knew someone that I knew and they had told her about me. And then she came over and walked in and said, hi, I’m so-and-so from national geographic. And of course I straightened up immediately like, whoa, this is, you know, and she goes, do you mind if I have a look at some of your work?

No, please, please. And she walked in and she had her hands kind of behind her back, you know, she was looking up and I, I was trying to like, get, get an idea of what, you know, how was she responding, but this woman sees the best photographs and some of the books, you know, arguably some of the best photographs in the world, you know, and she didn’t give me much response  which is, which was fine.

And she turned around and we talked for a second and she says, well, it’s nice to meet you. I’ve got to get back over to the, the cell, you know, off, she went. And I thought, well, wow, that was cool, but I didn’t know what I expected, but wow. That close, you know? Yeah. And then six months later was when we were out in, in Marfa and coming back and this thing showed up and they got, you got on their radar for sure.

A huge compliment, a huge honor to be even in the company. And I would go to DC annually to their gatherings and still keep in contact with a lot of the people that were, that I met. And tell me

Daran Herrman: [00:44:18] about a photo, any photo  that you just kind of remember whether there was some. You know, intense person or some emotion that came up positive or negative, just something that happened that, that with one of your photos, whether it’s a photo that you

Greg Davis: [00:44:34] sell or not, you know?

Yeah. I mean, I never did finish the story.  It’s about this image, but I never did really finished the story.  Going back to the girl, Sarah, that was at the bar, he said, Hey, I found this image of the blue and the green hands. And, you know, and, and this image was captured. It’s it’s, I call it the blanket Weaver and it’s indigo dyes on one woman’s hands.

So it’s a blue and a green hand. And  I was on a trail and far north of Vietnam, nine months into this one year trip around the world, nine months, the cycle of birth, I felt like at that moment on that trail, when I took that one shot  I was coming down as though it’s called Sapa up in the north and I was kind of coming down into this valley and.

This woman was coming up from below and we kind of, our past metaphorically literally crossed, you know, there was, and that was the moment right there. She was right in front of me, full traditional dress, black mom, pillbox hat, embroidered earrings  and walking in front of me, maybe 30 yards and, and her pants were flashing blue and green as she walked.

And I was just, wow. You know, to me and her hustled up behind her, tapped her on the shoulder. She turns around, sees me freaks out. Like it was, you know, I had to gain trust real fast about made myself smaller, put my hands up, you know, and then I went with a question because I didn’t speak Vietnamese, but

Daran Herrman: [00:46:04] it

Greg Davis: [00:46:04] wasn’t in your hands. It’s just like, and it loosened her up and I could see her kind of start as our wheels turning. Like, how do I.

Daran Herrman: [00:46:20] Yeah, that you’re weaving

Greg Davis: [00:46:22] audio. Right. And she did this and she did this, slap it in your head. I didn’t really know. Yeah. I, I, that candidate, but I didn’t at that time, I didn’t know that they, I mean, of course they worked with Indego, but I didn’t know what was going on. And she

Daran Herrman: [00:46:35] was, sounded like a little bit excited to show you.

She was a little bit, actually what I do,

Greg Davis: [00:46:39] this is what I do. So this guy’s interested. Wow, cool. It’s  there’s tourists going through there. So it wasn’t a completely like, oh my gosh, white man is in the middle of the, you know, it was just sort of startling to her, I think more than anything, but there’s a lot of tourism.

They even teach the younger mung  girls in, in, in the boys, in, in school, how to speak English. Right. So, you know  she, this woman did not speak it, but we got through it. And then I just said, Hey. Something, something told me just to have her hold them out. Is that okay? I took one picture and she looked at me like this guy’s crazy.

I have another photo of my, and I left and that was it. You know? And then, you know, three months later, I’m back home. One photo did like 1700,

Daran Herrman: [00:47:20] you know, like how we do it nowadays

Greg Davis: [00:47:21] with DSLRs one photo, one photo, one photo and put it away. And then this Sarah at the bar says, Hey, I found the one, the blue and the green hands.

I’m like, I had to think about it. So I went back out printed a few extra now cut to, I don’t remember what year, but I showed my work at ACL Austin city limits music festival for 13 years. There’s an art market on the grounds and a always an amazing experience, worldwide exposure at the coolest people sold a lot of artwork, believe it or not.

 I ship and deliver, so it didn’t have to walk out with them, you know, but  a story and there’s a, there’s a bazillion of these.  This one just came to mind. Because I just told it two days ago to  to my nephew. And  so there was a, I wanna say it was probably 2016. We’ll call it. I think it was 2016.

And what’s crazy is I’ll probably tell you, this is how I have about 8,000 contacts in my contact list. This syncs with my Mac and his name was Finley. Let me look up and see if he’s here. Finley

Finley Atkins ACL 2017, little five-year-old that bought my blanket waiver. So this kid is walking by my booth with his dad and he lets go of his dad’s hand and his dad kind of goes, Hey, are you good? And I’m saying, and the space, you know, the space is about this size. And I watched this child walk across and he breaks hands with his dad.

His dad’s like, Hey, where you going? And the kid bee-lined like straight into the booth and it was standing there. Looking up at the blue and the green hands, the bank. And we were just like, as I’m watching this whole thing happen and I’ve seen it before, I just w I, that’s the beauty of, that’s the beauty of doing, taking my own work to the show, if you will, and

Daran Herrman: [00:49:18] being in there too.

Cause a lot of times it’s somebody else showing it and just be it to interact with people, be a witness and also to get some of that feedback, understand what even what, not just what people buy, but what did people stand and see and interact with and seemed like they had emotional

Greg Davis: [00:49:35] draw too, be a witness.

And this guy brings his own work. He gets to watch people dance to his music. I like watching people dance to my music if I were to put it in a gallery. And here’s how that works. I put it in the gallery. Okay. We have an opening night, but after that it’s in the gallery. I walk over to the mailbox, open the mailbox.

Wow. A check. But that bank. Sure. Nothing meant for me, nothing. I play check whatever. Yeah. And I had a paycheck if I go and I get to witness you dancing. And the, my music, like, there’s nothing better for me. It takes some effort, but this kid dances to my music, he comes walking in at ACL standard, staring at the blanket Weaver shot for him.

It’s got to be like this massive picture. Right. And it’s abstract too. So it’s not clearly hands. It is, but it’s some abs and they’re different colors. Like he’s never seen anything colorful. Yeah. He’s five. So I was really curious. So I kind of took a few, he steps over kind of nonchalantly, you know, kind of eavesdropped in a little bit on the conversation.

And his dad leaned down to him. His dad says, well, son, it’s 1090 $5. I’m kidding. Can I shook his head like this and it was he’s five. He, and really the numbers thing, maybe still kind of figuring out what that means. 1090 $5. So he kind of walked around and I had a pretty, pretty big space and he walked kind of back in the back and around, and he was just looking up at everything and I couldn’t help myself.

So I went over, I have a little print bin that I sell a little $35 prints right now, walked over and I said, Hey, just so you know, I’ve got little ones that aren’t so much because I was thinking if the kid liked it, like how cool is it for a five-year-old to like one of my pictures, like, you know, it’s not about 7 35 bucks, but I’ve got little ones, you know, if you, so they made their way over to the print bin and they’re standing in front of the print, Ben and family can barely see over it.

And he’s like this. Yes. A few steps closer again, because I saw him getting in the conversation and I heard his dad say, well, you can have this. Yes. I can have the share.  you can have this. Or you can have the shirt, which camp both. You got to pick one. And then family looks up at his dad. He points at the space.

His dad looks at me and he goes, I guess we’ll take this. Huh? Wow. Right. And he goes, we’ll buy it. But if only two ship could ship it to us, I said, I’ll ship it to you, but I’m gonna ship it to him. What’s your name? Little guy. Cause I need to know. I just need to know your name. Look, I said, Finley said, okay, Finley, I’m going to ship this picture to you in the act.

What do you live, family? What’s your address? And he said, he looked up at his dad. He’s like 1 6, 7, his dad Alex’s dad was like wanting him to learn his address. Right. So was like 1 67 and he got it. Right. So we go, okay, cool. I said, well, it’s going to be about two weeks for it to come in the mail in the, you know, here’s my card.

Let me know if you guys don’t get it. And  why do you like that picture so much Finley and he’s five. He says, yeah, I don’t know. It’s just interesting. It’s one person who has a two colored hand you five, right? I said, well, let me tell you the story about this picture. I sit in the far north. I said, if you, if you go the other side of it and I’m talking to a five-year-old, so watered it down.

Five-year-old style, sit on the other side of the world world. There’s a country called Vietnam. And in the north, there’s a lot of big mountains in the north. And there are people in those mountains that take a plant called indigo and they grow it and they pull it up and they boil it in water and they make colors with it out of the plant.

They make the blue and they make the green and they make other colors, some other things. Right. But this woman made indigo die with these and she makes blankets cause it’s in the mountain. So it gets cold. So she makes these blankets to keep per family warm. Yeah. Five-year-old story. So he was just like, wow.

Okay, cool. And they say, okay, thank you, sir. Okay. We two weeks and they start to walk out and the father has this question mark, above his head as he walks out, just like I could tell by his face, he’s just going. As he’s walking, he’s shaking his head and he turns around and he said, man, I got to share this with you because that first off family right there, right there.

First of all, I’ve never seen my son go beeline, right. Towards a piece of art or anything like that. Like he likes, you know, dinosaurs and talk to trucks and Legos or whatnot. Yeah. According to me, like nothing like, like, and I don’t understand why I have no, when he did it and I bought it. I still don’t. I still didn’t get it.

But you told me this story. I just gotta share it with you. I don’t know why I’m going to be sharing with this with you because family’s named after his grandfather is his mother. There’s Mr. Finley. He passed away two weeks ago and Mr. Finley fought in the Vietnamese war. Oh my. And I can’t tell you why in the hell this has happening.

I don’t know. But I just wanted to share that with you. So for me, it kind of gives me chills to think about what’s happening behind the veil. Right. We don’t know what’s happening behind the veil. Like Finley’s, grandfather’s spirit is still could be around family, his grandfather, I guarantee you had some trauma from his, what he saw in Vietnam.

Most likely, I don’t know, but probably did. Right. And genetically we’re passing our DNA and our genes down to our children. And so I think that this was a way that now his grandson can live with a beautiful giving image of Vietnam open,

Daran Herrman: [00:55:08] so openness as opposed to closed, right. The hands  facing up. Man.

That’s so interesting.  Okay. So, so you have like now much more successful photographer, get to do it full, which to most photographers that’s to assess and its own self. And you’ve gone through a bunch of  ups and downs, obviously along the way. Any advice you’d give like your high school self you’re you’re, you know, you’re doing the yearbook self, and anything you would say to you back then.

Greg Davis: [00:55:39] Poof, that’s a good question because we can all use advice even now. I mean, get, give me some advice. It’s always good to have mentors. It’s always good to have people in front of you who have gone down this path. You know, it would have been amazing. I mean, I I’m happy with the way things are, but it really would w what would happen if I would have gone to that art?

When I said, when dad said, where do you want to, what do you want to do soon art school? If I would have gone to art school and really used the gift, maybe it wouldn’t have been a gift at that point, maybe wait, and needed to wait. So you don’t, you can’t question what it is, you know, like it, it happened the way that it happened and I’m happy that it happened that way.

It’s it’s I wouldn’t change it. Advice to the young man.  Just. You know, back then, I didn’t have a clue. I just be authentic and treat people with kindness and don’t sweat the small stuff and, you know, just try to find purpose in your life, you know, try, you know, have faith, devotion, yeah. Purpose. And  that’s, we’re all here to connect to something greater than ourself, you know, or, or we have, or we’ve given up hope completely.

And don’t believe in that that’s one way to live and that’s okay. But I think most of us are looking to connect to something greater than ourselves. Where do we find that connection and how do we find that connection through our partner, through our, you know, our work through our community? You know, what about

Daran Herrman: [00:57:09] any regrets along the way?

Greg Davis: [00:57:14] I don’t think so. I don’t think so. Cause they’ve all been learning experiences, you know, I mean the attack, you know, I could say, well, I’ve kind of regret walking into that bar that night or whatever, or walking into that situation that night, but he’s such a different person, but it really changed my life, you know?

 Bad shit can do. Can I say that on here? Oh, you can say whatever you want. I bet you can. It happened to all of us. Right. And, and, and, and it’s it’s can be the biggest blessing ever. And it was, it is, you know, I, I forgive him, the guys, it took me a while to forgive them. And I think, I think that forgiveness is huge.

And, and the word you can say, the word I forgive them, but you know, when you’ve truly forgiven somebody  because he can

Daran Herrman: [00:57:58] let go. Totally. Yeah. You don’t forgive them if you’re still holding on, right.

Greg Davis: [00:58:04] You still carry it around the side. It’s

Daran Herrman: [00:58:05] freedom. When you can let go. It’s hard to do it is. So I end every podcast with this question.

 But that’ll be my last question. So how would you like to be remembered?

Greg Davis: [00:58:17] Well, fortunate actually, I’m in a visual art, you know  and I could simply say, you know, my work is going to live on.  And through my art, I would like to be known through the art. I mean, that’s going to be my voice when I’m gone.

Right. So I could, could lean on that and say, you know, in the work you can see the spirit, you can see the empathy, you can see the compassion for others. You can see the, we are one in the work. I hope that’s where it’s coming from. Okay. It’s coming from, why can’t we all just get along? Let’s all realize how beautiful we are individually, no matter where we are, where we’re from, who we are, what stuff we’ve done.

Even if you have been a bad person, it doesn’t mean you can’t move out of that. I mean, you can move through that. So hopefully the work, you know, will be a voice for me. Once this physical body is gone  At the end of the day, it’s about family and about community and being important and giving to those in your immediate circle.

I think, you know, you, we all have reaches, you know, and those reaches are important, but ultimately it comes down to that inner circle and just trying to be real and authentic and have conversations that have meaning. And  you know, there’s a, in Mexico, the day of the dead, they believe that you died twice.

The first time that you die is when your physical body passes. The second time that you die is when your name is last spoken, right?

Daran Herrman: [00:59:41] And it might be awhile for years,

Greg Davis: [00:59:42] especially with the work I, you know, I’m not going for fame. It’s a, it’s a slippery slope. I see it. I’ve witnessed it in other people. And  I’d like for the work to be known and the, like for the work to really speak to people and they really feel  connected to, to that.

It’s all about them. You know, at the end of the day, it’s about educating people through the work, but it’s also about, and I get to witness this, that that’s the beauty again, that goes back to me, hustling the way that I hustle, getting the work in front of people and me being there is I get to witness the connection that’s made.

So it’s this triangle  impacted and co-creating the work with the sun. Bringing it to someone else who’s then having their own individual experience of that. And so what a gift

Daran Herrman: [01:00:24] I’ll it has been a big pleasure to have you on the podcast today.  Greg Davis, photography.com and I’ll have a bunch of all your social leaks in the  in the show notes, but

Greg Davis: [01:00:34] I enjoyed it.

Great. Thank you so much. Cheers. Yeah.