Kenny Lackey 9/8/25 Kenny Lackey 9/8/25

St. Louis Art Fair 2025 & Additions to the Family

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I picked up a couple new cameras this weekend, with one contributing some images below: the Ricoh GRIIIx HDF and in the opposite direction, a Pentax 6x7 MLU.

I think I’ll skip the EXIF data for these two iPhone shots.
I added a rubberized case and a small metallic thumb grip to the GRIIIx that fits in the hot shoe—although I also ordered a 3D printed waist level viewfinder which mounts to that shoe (the flange you see at the camera’s top left), and I imagine will spend more time there. The Ricoh GR series is based on an APS-C sensor (Advanced Photography System-Cropped), which is smaller than the traditional 35mm format. The equivalent focal length of its fixed lens is 40mm in 35mm format, and the HDF stands for Highlight Diffusion Filter. I’ve not yet spent much time with it, but I immediately loved it.

My first film camera. This particular model was most likely made in the mid 70s, and features a small button on the left of the lens mounts that allows for MLU (mirror lock-up, which prevents the mirror from slapping shut for just a split second after I press the shutter button). I put a full roll of Kodak 100 Ektar through it at the fair today—ten exposures. I braced for a whole new workflow but other than getting used to manual focus I felt at home right away. I love the way the controls feel, the grid in the prism viewfinder, the heft and sturdiness. No images in this post from the Pentax, but I dropped them off for development at Schiller’s and they should be ready in less than a week.

50mm | f/3.5 | 1/16000 | ISO 1250
I personally love shooting in harsh, full light, especially if I have fun colors to work with and this fair didn’t disappoint there.

40mm | f/8 | 1/200 | ISO 200 (shot on the GR IIIx)
I edited these the same as I do the shots from the Canon R6ii, but you can tell there’s difference in the inherent color profiles between their sensors. At least to my eye the profile runs slightly cooler and even though there’s no filter on, the light in general seems softer. The HDF was off

40mm | f/7.1 | 1/200 | ISO 200. (shot on the GRIIIx)

Kenny Lackey 9/4/25 Kenny Lackey 9/4/25

Paint Louis - Labor Day Weekend #3

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A two mile stretch of the St. Louis flood wall gets a fresh splay of graffiti murals every Labor Day weekend, with invitations going out to artists all over the country. Construction of the eleven mile long flood wall began on February 24, 1959 and reached completion in 1965, with the murals starting at its most northern point, maybe a quarter mile south of the arch. Many walk this event, but many are on bikes, skateboards, scooters, motorcycles, or even cars and trucks. There’s a paved road right at the wall and not far from that there’s a broad gravel path running parallel for maybe the second half of the event area.

Everyone—especially the artists—was so welcoming and in great spirits. Skateboarders, fans, St. Louisans of every stripe… of all the events I go to, this is the one that to me best represents this city.

Kenny Lackey 9/3/25 Kenny Lackey 9/3/25

Japanese Festival - Labor Day Weekend #2

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I don’t have too many photos from Japanese Festival in the Missouri Botanical Gardens to offer this year. I was there for a few hours, but took my time and was selective about framing things up. I love this festival and regret not making it back for a follow up shoot on day two, there was just a lot to cover and I was tuckered out by Sunday. I missed the Greek Festival at St. Nicholas and the Central West End Jazz and Blues Fest altogether.

35mm | f/4.5 | 1/640 | ISO 200
I’m still sheepish with the 35mm prime lens. I love the way it shoots, I’m just very used to framing things with a 50mm view. This family happened to take a knee together right in front of me as I ate a quick lunch of noodles and I surreptitiously changed from the 50 to the 35 and grabbed this.

35mm | f/4 | 1/1000 | ISO 10000
I like it when one set of eyes finds the lens. The little girl on the right was on to me, while the others chatted amongst themselves. The fast shutter and high ISO are a result of the mixed lighting—a bright background of full windows in the background, with the same windows at my back lighting the subjects along with indoor lighting. I could have corrected the graininess in post but in this case I liked it.

50mm | f/5 | 1/500 | ISO 640
Bonus shot—a scene of couples dancing at the Tower Grove Farmer’s Market 20th anniversary.

Kenny Lackey 9/1/25 Kenny Lackey 9/1/25

Tour de Lafayette 2025 - Labor Day Weekend #1

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I hadn’t been to the Gateway Cup as a photographer before and a friend pointed this particular course out as a potential shoot. I found it enjoyably challenging! I also hadn’t ever messed around with panning before: locking the focal point onto a moving target and attempting to sweep the camera in sync with the subject. This will be the first of I think three posts from this welcome long weekend. It wasn’t restful—I put in twenty miles on foot with camera gear in just two days—but it was a joy.

St. Louis is a special prism for experiencing American life. The most salient elements about being American are blasted through in sharper color, and that’s been the case for well over a hundred years. There’s a lot packed into that thought and I started to expound before my editorial ear announced itself and deleted everything. I think I can get away with just noting that late August is a particularly good time to be here. It was easy to love St. Louis this weekend.

85mm | f/16 | 1/1600 | ISO 2500
Weird use of an 85mm, stopping all the way down to f/16, but I had Steven Spielburg in my mind as I went into this shoot as I knew I was seeing Jaws for the 50th anniversary this weekend. Spielburg almost always shoots stopped down so that everything is in focus. In stills, whether you want that really depends on the composition and in this case I shot a set as the peloton approached stopped down and at a loco shutter speed hoping to get isolated subjects despite the flattened focus.

85mm | f/3.5 | 1/1600 | ISO 250
This is the more common approach: shoot with the aperture wide open so that the lens can focus on a single plane and wash out everything else with bokeh.

50mm | f/14 | 1/125 | ISO 2000
A cyclist took a serious fall, the rest of the racers hold up. The stretcher on the back of the ATV shown is empty, but the fallen rider was on the one in front of it.

50mm | f/16 | 1/200 | ISO 10000
I like this composition, but it could have been great if I’d taken more time—maybe set the f/ value at about half what it’s at, dropped the ISO way down and slowed the shutter. I’m pretty sure this was shot with the ND filter on, but not positive.

Kenny Lackey 8/29/25 Kenny Lackey 8/29/25

Festival of Nations 2025

After a sometimes brutal summer St. Louis was gifted with a perfect weekend for my favorite event here, Festival of Nations. This year saw a smaller footprint with fewer food vendors. About the same or even more turned out compared to last year, though, so it felt rather packed on the main paths without being uncomfortable or overly difficult.

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Kenny Lackey 8/17/25 Kenny Lackey 8/17/25

Taste of St. Louis

I go to events because I want to photograph people, and in St. Louis this is best done by way of its events. At these events people are often curious and friendly towards photographers. I like this aspect of going out. Someone came up Friday evening and bumped my elbow with his, offered me a piece of chicken out of a full basket and walked away after a brief exchange. Saturday a young woman approached and asked about my camera, and said that she would be a photographer one day. A half dozen interactions or so when I go out to an event is about par.

It’s unfortunate that this particular event moved to Clayton and the decision pretty well gutted turnout compared to last year—not that it felt empty, but it was underpopulated for sure. And understandably. For my purposes though it made it easier to frame things up.

50mm | f/9 | 1/125 | ISO 100
This is my favorite photo from the set. The man on the left with a coke and an hors d'oeuvres of some kind, the woman in the middle curious about what treats the pair on the right have alighted upon, and the pair on the right reviewing their finds. I took many snaps of this particular scene and there’s an amusing frame a split second later with the woman in the middle sporting a face that seems to say “Oh okay!” in approval of the pair’s snacking choices. It’s not a stellar photo, I know, but mostly what I like is the light. I really like pairing an ND filter with the 50mm. This is direct, full sun with no hood… I just think the light is beautiful.

50mm | f/11 | 1/60 | ISO 250
The lighting in this parking lot was also quite nice. It just nicks dad here, but if you look off to his left you can see a clutch of folks lit not by the sun directly, but coming off an office building’s west facing reflective windows and dappling the lot below. I wish that I had gotten super low for this and was angled up at them.

50mm | f/11 | 1/60 | ISO 200
I’m including this one despite it not making grade, because my one regret from this shoot was this standing table area. Shooting off to the side like this I was drawing a lot of wandering eyes from the tables whenever I took aim, but I really should have squeezed the scene, trusted my instincts and been patient. That and I should have moved to the other side of this trash can. I love setups like this (which, again, I failed to convey here) where the setting encourages layers form.

50mm | f/11 | 1/60 | ISO 400
Simba Sambosa, a Ugandan restaurant in STL, with George cooking.

85mm | f/1.2 | 1/250 | ISO 1000
This couple filled the space between the crowd and the band and stole the show. They also gave me (and the crowd) a lot of great moments, and I found it hard to edit it down to just a couple to share! Given the shutter speed and that the sun had set, I was battling rolling shutter a bit but I think it worked out alright.

50mm | f/1.2 | 1/30 | ISO 500
This is from Foodies Eat First Fest, which was held in the old Trust Bank downtown. I think the event meant to capitalize on the Yankees being in town, as what you are looking at is a pastrami sandwich from Katz Deli out of the lower east side, NYC. There was a $50 entrance fee, and this half sandwich then cost $35. I was aesthetically obligated to purchase one as I love Katz. Did I feel foolish? Definitely. But it was also excellent, and I figured hey, when is the next time this NYC establishment is going to visit the Lou.
In contrast, Taste of St. Louis was free and more relaxed, the crowd was friendlier and more fun both to speak with and to shoot, and the food was just as good. A weekend pass to Foodies Eat First would have run you a minimum of $300, or much more for a VIP weekend pass. Good luck to them!

Kenny Lackey 8/10/25 Kenny Lackey 8/10/25

Downtown Blues

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I have a clutch of pictures mostly focussed on Blues at the Arch to share. This is a festival co-authored by the Blues Museum and Arch to Park across a few days and locations near to the arch. By the end of the shoot I looked like I’d jumped in a pool, sopping wet with sweat.

50mm | f/2 | 1/4000 | ISO 12,800
Thursday, August 7th, Washington Ave. A rare glimpse of me on the right!

35mm | f/1.4 | 1/4000 | ISO 100
Tower Grove Park, Saturday morning.

50mm | f/1.4 | 1/1000 | ISO 10000
The new Cardinal Glennon Children’s hospital going up at Choteau and Grand.

Kenny Lackey 8/3/25 Kenny Lackey 8/3/25

Respite

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July’s heat broke this past Thursday and August came in as beautifully as she might have. We’ve had four uninterrupted days in the low 80s. The first two were hampered a bit by drifting wildfire smoke, but the last two were within spitting distance of perfection. These are some scattered shots since Friday evening.

85mm | f/1.2 | 1/320
David has been working at The Vine for eight years, and spoke with me about his care of the plants and patio in particular on Friday night.

35mm | f/1.4 | 1/8000
Fountain Park, NE corner, 10 weeks later.

85mm | f/1.2 | 1/16000
This morning I visited Dutchtown for a photowalk. I found it to be one of the most friendly neighborhoods in St. Louis, to a degree that almost made me feel like I was in *The Truman Show*.

85mm | f/1.2 | 1/16000
Innovation can be a roadblock.

35mm | f/1.4 | 1/8000
Not the first I’ve photographed this alley off 10th street.

35mm | f/2 | 1/16000
Citygarden Sculpture Park

Kenny Lackey 7/29/25 Kenny Lackey 7/29/25

Javadaroo

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Javad celebrated a birthday this last weekend, and in what I take to be Javad-esque fashion he hosted a wonderful party on Cherokee that doubled as a fundraiser for St. Louis immigrants. I’ve only met him within the last year. He’s a singular sort: the infectious and wild energy a comedian or improv artist might have, a deep intelligence you wouldn’t want to be on the wrong side of, and most notably an unassailable warmth. I also didn’t know most of the crowd but the atmosphere was one of gathering and celebration and play. And tacos and drinks.

50mm | f/6.3 | 1/60
Apparently I really liked shooting from this spot. I think for the first hour or so I was just getting used to shooting in this new setting and it was tricky with the lighting. I didn’t want to get up in front of the stage and shoot outwards into the crowd, but I should have at some point.

85mm | f/1.2 | 1/640
The man of the hour!

50mm | f/1.2 | 1/320
T-Dubb-O takes the stage!

85mm | f/1.2 | 1/80
Tef Poe. Both artists shattered the room. They brought the goods.

Kenny Lackey 7/22/25 Kenny Lackey 7/22/25

Newstead

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Any day of the week you’ll find residents continuing the cleanup and recovery effort by hand, amongst themselves and with a now thinned volunteer force. I’m among those that flagged off and the burnout is real. But also to be clear, if you go out you do still see volunteers and neighbors helping each other. I recently photographed Newstead and its side streets.

These are just maybe a dozen or so homes of thousands, on just a handful of streets out of hundreds.

50mm | f/3.5 | 1/640
Garfield Lacy. He was trapped under the rubble of his 3400sf brick home for five hours, shown in the image above and also below. He was found by cadaver dogs.

50mm | f/3.5 | 1/400
A bare foundation a few houses north of Garfield’s.

50mm | f/5.6 | 1/400
Childhood home of Terry Moore (above). She lives just across the street now, but grew up in this home with twenty siblings. One of her sisters was born in the morning of the ‘56 St. Louis tornado, and died on the morning of this one. She told me that she was lifted out of her doorway but then thrown and pinned to the ground in her front yard, and that the only word to describe what it looked like was a “monster.” That it seemed to choose homes and that when it did it devoured them.

Kenny Lackey 7/19/25 Kenny Lackey 7/19/25

July, No Fourth

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50mm | f/2.5 | 1/400
I’m switching to include shutter speed with every photo in addition to focal length and the f/ stop. I would gladly share ISO but I don’t see a way of retrieving that from file info.
Anyway this is a beautiful marble torchiere in the downtown STL main library Great Room, original to the building although new floor standards were installed with brass mold torchieres and alabaster bowls for the lighting elements. The original library was completed in 1865, although the building as we know it now, the Cass Gilbert main building, wasn’t completed until 1912, and this most recent renovation wrapped in 2013.

50mm | f/2.5 | 1/40
Detail of the alabaster base. Just beautiful work. You could spend a lifetime diving into the architectural details of St. Louis.

85mm | f/2.5 | 1/400
I like the idea behind this shot, a kid’s bike proudly and boldly parked on a Tower Grove South sidewalk on a late St. Louis summer afternoon (the young sir is just off frame on a porch). It’s not a good image as I should have stood up rather than crouching—the handlebars and upper frame are lost in the background.
There’s nothing holding this post together thematically, by the way. Maybe ‘summer,’ but really just a random assortment of images from the past couple of weeks, and I did absolutely nothing for the Fourth—hence the title. Every year I think ‘this is the year I’ll go downtown for the fireworks,’ and I will mean it and hold that thought with gusto. And then the day of, I get to thinking about crowds and heat and parking and traffic getting in and out and blah blah. Also this year I was thinking of the particular awkwardness of shooting that kind of event. Anything where a lot of people are either just standing still or sitting down is a challenge to shoot, at least for me.
There are some shots below of Whitaker Music Festival and I felt the same there, namely that I didn’t really enjoy shooting the crowd and I felt weird about it. Whereas I don’t feel much discomfort at, e.g., Festival of Nations or some event where folks are milling about, doing people things. Part of the issue is access. To properly cover an event like a concert, you would need a press pass.

85mm | f/2.5 | 1/500
This is at the ruins at Tower Grove Park, last Saturday morning. Snugs.

85mm | f/1.2 | 1/2000
Whitaker Music Festival at the Missouri Botanical Gardens, July 2nd, with Saint Chuck playing. I moved all throughout the crowd and I would usually say something like, “May I be incredibly rude for a moment, join you, take pics for thirty seconds, and then leave?” That part was fine and I did get some good coverage of the band that way, but there was no way of covering the seated crowd that would be both 1) comfortable for all parties involved and yet also 2) form a decent composition. The below isn’t terribly engaging to me, but it’s a decent sort of abstract impression of a hot July evening at MoBot.

24mm | f/16 | 1/320 (ND variable filter on)

50mm | f/5.6 | 1/160
St. Louis Art Museum, last Saturday, July 12th.

85mm | f/5.6 | 1/160
Construction on the Tower Grove Connector.

50mm | f/6.3 | 1/400
A Friday movie series showing Frozen at Keiner Plaza last night, with special guest.

85mm | f/1.8 | 1/160
Saturn Lounge, Cherokee Street

50mm | f/3.5 | 1/400
Someone left this abstract bouquet near the park ruins this morning.

5.7mm | f/1.5 | 1/800 (iPhone)
Ryan and his pops mixing up cement for Ryan and Nicole’s forthcoming outdoor kitchen.

Kenny Lackey 6/30/25 Kenny Lackey 6/30/25

Solstice

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Last week I took off Tuesday and Thursday to spend some vacation time that otherwise would have gone away in July. On Tuesday Ryan and I drove down to Elephant Rocks and then over to the Johnson Shutins.

50mm, f/1.8
Because it was a Tuesday it was relatively quiet. On the weekend all these rocks would be covered and as I mentioned the last time I posted about the Shutins (last September) this is a fun spot to shoot. To my eye it feels like a *Where’s Waldo* cartoon the way this part of the river layers when seen from the boardwalk.

5mm, f/4
This was taken on a Canon PowerShot SX170 I’ve had since 2010 and keep in my bag as a reliable and conspicuous point-and-shoot. A brief downpour hit and I wanted to see if I could get an interesting composition by swimming out a bit and taking a shot from water level. I didn’t bring the rain sleeve for my main rig, however, and so risked the dutiful PowerShot (which survived!).

14mm, f/22
Walking through the newly re-opened old courthouse.

50mm, f/9
Yesterday I stumbled on a corn hole competition downtown. I learned that corn hole—with no offense—isn’t the easiest sport to capture. Or maybe it’s more like: for the corn hole pro, you would know what to photograph and how, but I was at a loss as to what the lens was supposed to do. Folks came from all over Missouri and Illinois, and many had sports jerseys for their teams. There’s a nice sort of alley on the approach to Busch Stadium and many dozens were set up there with rings of camp chairs, keeping cool in the shade. Below is my attempt at an action shot. I think what you would need to do is throw on like a 135mm lens and shoot from across the person throwing but behind their opponent.

50mm, f/9
If there’s any unifying theme to the various shoots I did on Saturday, it’s that context improves everything about your photography and it’s going to show if you don’t understand what you’re shooting. As I frequently get to experience. This comes up again below in the auto show I went to right after this downtown photowalk. I don’t know a thing about cars and I think I turned in some alright images, but you can also tell I’m not an auto photographer and I don’t know how to present something like an engine block.

50mm, f/9
After walking a bit more downtown I left directly for a classic car show in Breckenridge. I’m more interested in this image than in most anything else about the cars. To me “old men look at car” is going to trump the car itself every time.

85mm, f/9
The winning car, I believe a ‘56 Chevy. Someone milling around it informed me that the car appeared to be 100% original.

Kenny Lackey 6/23/25 Kenny Lackey 6/23/25

Sunday Downtown and a Show at the Royale

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Yesterday I spent the particularly hot June morning in downtown St. Louis, just seeing what there was to see. I took my usual spot on Locust between 7th and 16th and traipsed all over—the length of Washington, all around the plaza, down any street with appealing light. Shoot street photography is borderline impossible when there is only one person on a street. Yes, you can shoot them, but the odds that they’re doing anything interesting or can serve a photo in a compelling way are about nil, and as they’re isolated their attention is going to be on you.

But then, while I spend 98% of these photowalks thinking ‘it is really hot and this is stupid,’ without fail there’s usually at least one interesting thing that happens. In this case, I was walking north onto 8th from Market when these two young guys called out asking if I wanted to film something.

And in fact, I did. I had intentionally crossed over to see if I might be able to shoot them because one was skateboarding. I was ready to scrap this plan though as on approach I noticed that his friend was filming him and I didn’t want to come in over that. But it was actually the friend that called out and invited me over.

85mm, f/16
This is the first photo I’m posting out of my newest lens: an RF mount, 85mm f1/2 USM, L-series glass. I purchased it the previous morning but other than a few test shots around the house, yesterday’s photowalk was the first time putting it through the paces. And between some action shots, a protest march, and an evening concert I was pleased with the results!
The above doesn’t look like what you’d expect from an 85mm, because this lens is most commonly used for portraiture. I waited more than a year before committing to this piece of kit. It’s expensive glass for one thing, but I wanted to prove to myself that this focal length was important for getting the kinds of shots I like. And over the last year I noticed that especially while shooting more dynamic events where I was in the mix, I would find myself making sure I switched to 85mm in order to get closeups. Some of my favorite sorts of shots are where I have a clear subject but in the mix with a bunch of other people.

50mm, f/16
I don’t recall what street this is on but I’ve long been drawn to this wall for its texture. I’ve tried to photograph it a few times and I still haven’t quite found a way of conveying what it is that appeals to me.

50mm, f/16
I’m not sure what this fellow was doing, but I did see him raise his arm once in a salute to a skateboarder that had waved to him. He was standing alone like this at the bottom of the steps down to the Mississippi.

85mm, f/14
After a few hours downtown I drove over to Forest Park, felt uninspired probably by the harsh light and heat, then I skipped over to Euclid for a few where I got a text that there was a protest downtown. I wasn’t expecting an action that day, but I was excited to get to march and photograph them.

85mm, f/7.1
When I made it back that way I found this little guy was splayed out on the outskirts of Keiner Plaza just trying to keep cool.

50mm, f/16
This was another well-run protest with wholly supportive reactions from the Cardinals fans walking around and the cars that had to stop for us. St. Louis is a very blue dot in a very red sea. And I’m still not used to this level of coordination with police, but it’s preferable to kettling and intimidation.

50mm, f/2.5
The day ended with a show at the Royale. Three artists and a DJ, and the ever-present heat, but with a bit of a breeze, the trellised grape canopy, and drinks, it made for a great June evening.

Kenny Lackey 6/14/25 Kenny Lackey 6/14/25

No Kings

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Today while the President held a military parade in honor of his birthday over two thousand communities protested the absurd display. St. Louis was absolutely one of them with many protests in the region. I chose to go downtown, because I may be one of the very few St. Louisans kind of crushing on downtown.

50mm, f/10
The police protected the protest route, and dynamically even—following behind or blocking off intersections as needed. In my experience of St. Louis protests, while this wasn’t a first it felt to me the most cooperative and the most intentionally non-combative I’ve seen. Zero riot gear, for example.

Kenny Lackey 6/9/25 Kenny Lackey 6/9/25

Heartbreak

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A year pressed itself into three weeks, and a generation’s worth of hurt was ratcheted into five minutes. Bricks flew at 150mph blowing holes clear through cars, trucks, and buildings. Vehicles were left mangled and flipped, hundreds if not thousands of roofs sheered clear or partially off, side walls and parapets collapsed, windows were blown out and glass was shattered all over—everywhere. A spaghetti of power lines lay down the alleys and backyards, trees exploded and splayed across many streets or crushing cars or homes, most cell towers and street lights down.

A mile wide scratch cut through North St. Louis on Friday, May 16th, about 3pm. The tornado was given a preliminary EF3 rating two days later. Over six thousand homes were either destroyed or majorly damaged with over ten thousand structures damaged.

It happened to hit the redlined neighborhoods almost exclusively. Academy-Sherman, Jeff-Vander-Lou, The Ville, Fairground, Fountain Park, Penrose, Kingsway West, and more—they are living in the post-apocalypse, surrounded by relative normalcy in all directions. Forest Park and Lindell, and Dutchtown, all also hit, with Forest Park dramatically scarred in particular. Not to mention the wild destruction in Sikeston, MO, that same day, and the same supercell from there putting down another massive tornado in Tennessee. There were fifty-five tornadoes across the midwest and south over May 15 & 16 resulting in 28 deaths. Seven were in St. Louis by the final count. The London tornado later that same night tracked through London and Somerset, KY. It was an EF4 on the ground for over 90 minutes and had 19 deaths, hundreds of injuries. I’ll share more context for the 2025 tornado season towards the end.

In North St. Louis thousands of families are left with storm damage, and again, over six thousand homes are in the ‘majors’ and ‘destroyed’ categories of damage. Many with active leaks. This is the time pressure piece and the public health concern. There’s a lot of drenched wood, drywall, particle board… I’ve walked up in many of these homes and the mildew smell was strong already the first week. We’ve had a lot of rain since then, and it’s going to get a lot hotter.

To drive around, what it looks like in terms of life is folk sharing time, sharing a porch, some yard work, a meal, a coffee—but this is a thoroughly shared experience. Nearly all of the initial clearing was done by hand, by the community. In the first few weeks if you were walking around maybe hauling debris to a curb there was a high chance someone would drive by and offer you a hot meal. There’s been a pervasive, grassroots feeding mission: hundreds of popup meal sites, often just a plastic table set up on a sidewalk and somebody cooking with a grill behind them, or a family making sandwiches. This was going in full force the first day, within hours I’m told. There are always trucks and crews working, especially on the power lines and trees. Very few are working on the homes, most of which were uninsured. That isn’t because this is a community that doesn’t want to insure their domiciles.

And if you live here I encourage you to drive around. If you haven’t been down Page or Newstead or MLK yet you can get a sense of it without disturbing anyone. St. Louis Ave would give you a good sense of it as well. I wouldn’t go down residential streets but arterials are fine. If you’re inclined, have the time, and are able, it’s also easy to pitch in with just a couple of hours here and there. Check out any of ActionSTL, Invest STL, 4TheVille, or Dream Builders for more grassroots involvement, or they can always use help at the Urban League or the Red Cross and the other national partners.

I started to write this post the Monday after the tornado, May 19th, and deleted quite a few drafts that day and since. It’s hard to write or think about. It doesn’t get to me during the day, but if I sit and let myself reflect on what all I’ve seen, heard and experienced, let alone try to write about it, that gets hard quick. I’m also exhausted and feel overwhelmed by the task before our community, and I’m grieving this event and what’s most likely to happen from here.

I’ve sat with residents in the shelters, swallowed nerves up on sketchy roofs, racked up splinters at distribution sites, chilled in a backyard and cracked a beer with a family, ate cold sandwiches and empanadas on tailgates, and against every instinct, also sat in meetings. Some meetings were exceptionally good. Some I will get a lot of mileage out of as examples of what not to do. I don’t know how yet, but this time changed my life. It’s been a privilege, truly, to see a breadth and depth of human experience these last weeks. I didn’t get a chance to document much of it, but I tried to keep my camera in the car and shot when I could. And many of these, noted with the 5.7mm focal length, were shot on iPhone.

50mm, f/16
Lindell Blvd across from Forest Park.

35mm, f/7.1
I found that I had to mostly watch the first tarp job I was on. I felt unsure of what to do or how it was to be done, and it’s not an intuitive process. It’s also not without some risk.

50mm, f/7.1
Ryan, forever getting it done, heart and hands.

5.7mm, f/1.5
I haven’t really had the time or energy to have any kind of informed approach to this in terms of photography. Why this image? It happened to be a corner I remembered because of the door and it was just one of many moments that pulls and cuts. Maybe in a weekend or two I’ll go out with the intent just to shoot, although from a photography perspective I have missed so much… I wish that I could have been devoted full-time to this. The community outpouring alone would have been a true honor to cover.
ActionSTL standing up critical services down at O’Fallon Park YWCA with a massive feeding and distribution hub, not to mention providing basically the hands and tactical vision for this disaster response. 4TheVille, InvestSTL, and Dream Builders for Equity holding down an incredible operation out of the 4144 MLK address, also doing distribution but community organization, temporary home repairs, sourcing—4144 MLK did a lot of very much needed targeted good. And the Urban League, which itself received damage at the Kingshighway and Page office, has stood up a six day a week community hub + feeding + wraparound services + non-congregate sheltering mission that has a line of cars a mile long… three weeks after the disaster.
It bears triple underlining that this response is very much the people’s response. I mean the people of St. Louis are the ones getting it done for this community.
The churches also stepped up in tremendous, humbling ways. So many churches and religious disaster relief groups. I saw and worked with Convoy of Hope, United Methodist Committee on Relief, Salvation Army, Missouri Baptist Disaster Relief, and on and on.
Thousands of volunteers have come out as well, maybe the majority unaffiliated. For example if you drove through Fountain Park anytime in the last few weeks, yes some of those tents were big organizations but for the most part it was neighbors.

5.7mm, f/1.5

This is Kevin. I don’t remember his last name, but we worked together for at least one morning if not a couple. He was one of maybe a couple dozen carpenters volunteering their time and skill, tarping homes with roof damage or just missing the entire roof.

50mm, f/5.6
Jessica, of Dream Builders, at 4144 MLK. She is smiling because she did not want her picture taken. You’d think that when someone doesn’t want their picture taken, I wouldn’t take it… but often that just makes me want to try to convince them that this is a good idea.
Most people don’t like pictures like this. It’s a bit dark and it’s hard to make out the subject’s features. What I like is that it captures Jessica in her element during this time, and it’s a bit isolated, chaotic, and ramshackle.

5.7mm, f/1.5
A crew loading up to go tarping, Saturday, May 24th.

5.7mm, f/1.5
Brandon from the Local 42 Carpenters, volunteering for Dream Builders. Or whoever. I don’t think affiliations mattered too much when it came down to it.
For those with this level of damage, ask and they will tell you: their number one priority and need right now is getting in the dry, even if just temporarily.

5.7mm, f/1.5
That’s Chris to Brandon’s left and behind him with the OSB is Matt. Matt walked up to us one day in Fountain Park and just said he wanted to help and could he come out the next morning, and then he did just that.

5.7mm, f/1.5
This is an extraordinary act of neighborliness. A man is building this tiny home for his neighbor, who lost everything. He had been working for two days on it when I took this, mostly using supplies from the emergency supply depots that have gone up. He gave his name but as the structure isn’t legal he asked that I not share it.

5.7mm, f/1.5
Where the parapets collapsed or had weaker tuck-pointing—or simply where the tornado was strongest—roofs peeled right up and off.

50mm, f/8
These brick piles are all over north STL, and have been for weeks.

5.7mm, f/1.5
Sikeston, MO. If you look closely beneath the bookcase there you can see a clearing in the rubble. That clean spot of carpet is where the woman who lived in this home flipped the couch (just off to the right) over herself as the Sikeston EF3 dissolved her home and then swirled it and other debris around her.

5.7mm, f/1.5
Sikeston, MO. These stairs led up to a second story of this home, which blew clear off.
This has been an incredible tornado season (NB: this article, while very good, is from May 23rd and so is missing the weeks of tornado data since). In the midwest and southwest we’ve been in a state of continuous response since March 14th, with well over 1,000 tornadoes so far. And tornado alley is shifting eastward, expanding, prolongating its reign each year, and becoming ever more dangerous. This is one of the many resiliency challenges we will face in the coming years—not in the distant 2050s, but next year, and the year after…
I’ll close for now with two other pictures of life in St. Louis. First, I took this at the May Food Truck Fridays in Tower Grove Park, one week before the tornado. It seems peaceful and sweet to me, and it was moving to find this in my camera as the last image before May 16th. Also, these are not my kids. I don’t have kids. If you zoom in on the mom off to the left in the red baseball cap, I think she’s wondering if she’s going to have to tackle me. But if you know her or these kids, let me know—I think the family would like this and I’ll get them a framed print.

5.7mm, f/1.5
And these are Nicole and Ryan’s chickens, who were very curious about me kneeling down to say hi. This past weekend I hung back and rested. I did the barest bones version of chores, errands, and groceries I could get away with. I sat in the sauna and the hot tub at the YMCA, and I enjoyed barbecue and conversation with friends, and just for a moment had a normal weekend in June.
(*The thoughts expressed here are my own and do not reflect the views of any organization)*

Kenny Lackey 5/4/25 Kenny Lackey 5/4/25

Cinco de Mayo - Rainy & Cold Edition

I paced up and down Cherokee for a few hours today in a cold, steady rain that might well have been an October day. Personally I loved it because I’m a grumpy old man, but I kept that to myself. I wondered if the crowd’s spirit might break in the dreariness of it, and I think it was perhaps listing that direction when a set of particularly bumpin’ songs from the main DJ booth set off a lively hour at least. And while not everyone was dancing it did reach a certain quorum, with a crowd around them.

Thought this was a defiantly spirited and deservedly well-attended street fair. Vendors shouting with aggressive warmth, everyone soaked despite our efforts, umbrellas bobbing, rows of every manner of meat grilling up. I found myself spying on multiple taco stands, making mental notes and hoping I picked the right one. I wore a waxed coat and rain boots, but between my mid-thigh and boot cuffs was water logged.

Below is the first shot where I felt warmed up. Awnings were prime real estate of course and presented a number of interesting moments and groupings.

50mm, f/5.6
You would think this might be a homeless person, but no, on closer inspection you’ll find a Hello Kitty poncho cloaking a ride-or-die lover of pineapples with little umbrellas stuck in them.

50mm, f/10
Now it’s not a stellar picture, but this was a fun moment. This woman in the black had been enjoying the music under an umbrella with someone else until after a moment she couldn’t take it any longer. She took off running for the impromptu coterie dancing.

Kenny Lackey 4/20/25 Kenny Lackey 4/20/25

‘Roaring’ at SLAM

It was, in my experience of it, a wonderful rainy Saturday morning in the city and I felt romantic about my urbanity. I got a latte from Pipers — where they seemed too stressed by new hires for small talk about the weather, and I felt that — and drove up Kingshighway from there to the Art Museum. Now the first choice I made after that was to duck into the parking garage. I’d been just a few weeks prior and it happened to be free parking that day. I wondered if perhaps I’d discovered a loophole, as parking under the museum is supposed to be $15/day for non-members. But no, I had to pay full freight.

Next, when I went to the parking deck vestibule door I knew to hit the handicap button, because the door is absurdly heavy, and I then promptly swung my camera bag around for the security guard to inspect. He looked inside and said “You seem to know what you’re doing,” and I thanked him solemnly while my heart leapt at being recognized as museum pro, which of course I am, and in I went. Now that isn’t essential to the story except that I was primed to think about my stature with the St. Louis Art Museum.

If you don’t live here, just know that it’s free. I arrived at the long concierge desk to get my ticket for ‘Roaring’ and I ask the teller, “So how much would an annual membership be anyway?” Real casual like that, while mildly stunned that I have chosen to say this aloud. “Seventy five dollars,” she says, “But if you paid for parking today we would take that off the top and you wouldn’t have to pay for the exhibit.”

Having paid $15 to park and facing another $15 charge for entry to the exhibit, my brain crumbled at the cost / benefit analysis before me and I would up securing a year long “membership” to our free museum for just $60. Plus free parking for the day.

Anyhow afterwards I saw a movie at the Alamo with friends, followed by dinner at the Foundry, and it was all very Saturday-y

50mm, f/3.5
I wish I could say they get more interesting, but for the most part this is what you’re in for. This blog, we’re just recording some daily life in the 314. But this picture would not pass muster for something I count as an engaging photo. It is, however, a beautiful car.

50mm, f/3.5
Let’s just all take a second to note that I’m not an automobile photographer, okay? So I didn’t quite fit everything in frame, or centered, in several shots…

50mm, f/3.5
Moody! I don’t like this shot particularly, but it’s approaching what I might like.

50mm, f/3.5
I will admit that I like this one, although we can’t tell much about the woman on the right. I actually prefer this image to one where we have an unobstructed view of this car.

50mm, f/3.5
I like this one. It took me a bit, but it feels abstract in a way I like.

50mm, f/4
Obviously not a part of the Roaring exhibit, i just like this piece and snapped a couple others around the museum.

Kenny Lackey 4/6/25 Kenny Lackey 4/6/25

Washington DC - ‘Hands Off’ Protest

Yesterday I woke up at 4am, caught a flight to DC, and was home by 8pm. I went both to participate in and also to photograph the nationwide Hands Off protest there. After Trump’s second inauguration I saw a set of pictures from a street photographer and was disappointed in myself for not being there. When the first real protest happened after two months of relative insanity I had a hunch I might fly in, and other than having a panic attack when I couldn’t immediately find coffee it was well worth it.

This was a broad coalition calling on the administration, DOGE, and Musk to keep in their lanes. The atmosphere was friendly and carnival-like: you might here a drum circle in one direction, over there a brass band, and over there a crowd chanting some classics. So the crowd milled and mixed, joyfully in a joyless time, and there was no counter-protest—apart from two individuals (shown later on) out of tens of thousands.

50mm, f/16
Other than a quick series I took in the National Gallery, this (above) was one of the last shots I took. It was one of a few dozen at a Free Palestine rally that broke off and was staging for the main protest to meet up with them and march to ICE headquarters.

50mm, f/16
I read a post from a street photographer who covered Hands Off NYC where he acknowledged protests are hard to cover. The crowds are dense and unwieldy, it’s difficult to convey the feeling through stills. And technically… a photograph is “supposed” to have a single subject. But personally I enjoy the above sort of image, where the subject isn’t distinct but at least a couple if not several things are happening and clearly portrayed. This one grabbed me but I had to choose from dozens like it. My favorite such composition I’ve taken is the women trying on Japanese robes at the MOBOT Japanese Festival, which you can see either in the ‘gallery’ tab or in the post I made on that festival.

50mm, f/16
The gentleman above was one of the two I mentioned that was there in counter-protest. And when I say it was tens of thousands on the one side and two on the other, in DC that is a precise breakdown.

Kenny Lackey 3/31/25 Kenny Lackey 3/31/25

Spring Storms

While I’ll be combining shots here from two shoots (March 22nd and March 29th), I’ve lately been more cognizant of how to approach these posts. Or maybe: how to approach going out for shoots if the end product is a post here. Even though this is two shoots it may as well function as a single outing: a meandering Saturday one weekend and a similar Sunday the next. Below is what I saw across Tower Grove, The Grove, Forest Park and beyond. As for what I intend to change about how I go about shoots, it’s just orienting slightly more towards narrative given that these are essentially photoessays. I have an out-of-town project next Saturday that I think will lend itself pretty well to that approach.

50mm, f/11
A couple taking a selfie under a blooming cherry tree.

85mm, f/2
I stumbled on a bag pipes player at the Turkish pavilion. He marched a bit back and forth and I tried to get permission for some shots with eye contact, but he neither declined nor nodded. But this was definitely the most happening thing on that side of the park at the moment, so…

50mm, f/13
This group of four chickens greeted me over by the Scottish Arms on Sarah St. I used to tend the little garden here and came by to see if anything was planted when I met these ladies. I wish for this one I’d gotten even lower, like eye level with them.

50mm, f/16
The flower beds in front of the St. Louis Art Museum.

50mm, f/8
I drove out about forty five minutes west to the Shaw Nature Reserve in Franklin County for the first time and decided to drive a bit around the area. I found this lot not far from the Reserve where one of the tornados ripped through a couple of weeks ago. There was quite a bit of damage besides in the area.

Kenny Lackey 3/18/25 Kenny Lackey 3/18/25

February & March, Stray Shoots

A few more images from the January snowfall. These few were taken late January or early February. Because of the deep cold that set in the snow hung around and compacted, and seemingly fused into a new form of ice.