Hello. I'm Loria.

[ SHE, HER, HERS ]

My name is Loria (pronounced low-rye-uh), but you can call me Lo. I've been shooting professionally for the last 11 years and have had a camera in my hands for the last 16. Photography is my love language.

Photos by Kyla Fear

Every summer, my grandfather would take my cousins and me to the cabin. We’d spend entire days building forts, shooting BB guns at his old beer cans, and fishing in the river. I never did like fishing; as a little girl, my heart was so tender and so quick to break and putting a worm on a hook always brought me to tears.

One summer, my grandfather handed me my fishing pole, but instead of going down to the river bank, we walked up to the porch and he handed me a cookie with a hole through it.

“We’re gonna fish for squirrels,” he explained.

And that’s exactly how we spent the whole afternoon (and many afternoons after that). Over and over, we’d throw the line over the edge and then giggle when we’d reel in a squirrel: one little hand grasping the cookie tight while trying desperately to untie it with the other.

I look back on that summer and see lessons of compassion and adaptability and patience, all of which are values I try hard to practice in my life and in my work.

There are three ways to ultimate success: The first way is to be kind. The second way is to be kind. The third way is to be kind.

(Mr Rogers)