Patrick is a Bay Area native, of sorts. Originally from North Carolina by way of Virginia, by way of Hong Kong, Patrick uses all of his life experiences to influence his photography.
I met Patrick in Oakland, CA. Our rendezvous was the Blue Bottle at the Washington and Ninth Street in the heart of Chinatown. Coffee is how Patrick, and myself, routinely begin our day. So it was only fitting to share a cup of coffee and have this conversation.
Our conversation started out by catching up and finishing our cappuccinos. It’s far from everyday that we get any type of one-on-one time with each other. Patrick brought his new Fujifilm XT-3 with him and set atop the light wood table. I ogled at his gear for a moment and proceeded to ask him questions about his recent purchase. I had my old but trusty Canon 6D MKI, Patrick was not as interested in my rig.
image by @patrck.lee
We have a unique relationship, Patrick and I. Between the two of us we make up a portion of a small outfit called @Photogpace. The remaining members being: Gene Torno, Rj Agcamaran, Zack Pianko, Shawn Remy and Chris Corona. Without any real schedule or cadence we attempt to meet up once or twice a month as a complete unit to go for rides, either road or dirt, and ride at a leisurely pace fit for in saddle photography or a quick photo session if not both. There’s no obligation to hammer away on our bikes. And conversely there’s no obligation to take photos if all we want to do is ride. But we ride just to ride and that’s how Patrick and I originally started our friendship.
We went through quite a bit of conversational meandering before we really got to into a groove. Yet, it is fitting that we started off speaking about the inception of this very website and the idea of perfection. After several months of purchasing the initial domain name I realized I made a mistake. I hated it. I immediately wanted to shelf it because it wasn’t what I wanted. It wasn’t inspiring. I had no clue where I wanted to go with it at that point and it was the most frustrating moment I had in a while. I thought I was so close to starting something new but then I felt like I was going backwards.
“It’s gotta be perfect man!” Patrick explains
“No! You know what? I hate trying to make things perfect. That’s how you don’t get shit done. You know what I mean? I don’t know about you but if I go out and shoot people [street photography] I have this idea of what I’m gonna get and if I don’t get it then I’m really hammering myself. For the last six months I’ve had to train myself not to do that. You go out and you shoot. You’re constantly making it better but not perfect.”
”But you know what? That’s what makes your photos and your content you.” Patrick jumped in.
image by @patrck.lee
It’s interesting to add that although Patrick’s Instagram account, @Patrick.Lee, is primarily cycling, at least on the surface, or the initial three rows on his feed, he stays away from the obligation to post things that are exclusively cycling in order to stay within the algorithmic boundaries of growth for Instagram. There are so many schools of thought in regards to growth on social media and it’s clear that Patrick isn’t adhering to any of these thoughts. On Patrick’s feed he draws from all corners of his life to create the beautiful account that he has… and he’s still growing.
“Do you think your work gets identity from everything else you do in life?”
“I do. I think we all do. I think that’s the interesting part. Some people that are creative I believe they connect [all] the things in their life a certain way… either the color, [the] tone or something, everything is some how connected [to their life] I think. And those who are not as creative maybe-“
“They don’t connect as much.”
image by @patrck.lee
“Yeah! I think when you're in creative or to be in photography you have to a certain level of OCD about everything. Or you just can’t… And when you have a certain consistency in your life you can see that same level of consistency in your work.”
“I went to boarding school and was sent away when I was young. When you grow up that way you kind of relay everything back to that. That for example, having to learn self discipline and independence early on and needing to do things [my way] translates back to my work and what I do in general not just in creative or photography. That’s why I get annoyed when it comes to imperfection.”
For anything good, in my opinion, everything is tucked neatly away in the details. From the best stories, to your favorite song, to products from the most luxurious brands in the world, the “details” are the secret sauce to creating something that truly captures its audience. With that being said, when you have “the sauce”, you still have to know how to mix it. You have to have the ability to regulate yourself and know when to add it, when to subtract it and most importantly how to balance it.
As we started to approach the meat of our conversation, Patrick’s origin story, the loud gurgles of espresso machines quieted, the hissing of steamers silenced. Truly, by this point, it was just Patrick and myself along with very few other patrons having a conversation about life.
“My story is I didn’t come to this country until I was 10. I was brought over here by my mother. She was in the garment business managing factories that made Ralph Lauren and Tommy Hilfiger and stuff like that back in the days. Many of these factories were ran by Chinese at the time. These factories were in Central America because that’s where low labor would be. My parents oversaw a few factories - where I actually lived [Central America] for a year. So eventually we ended up here [the US] in North Carolina of all places, where back then cost of labor was low and brands wanted it to be ‘American Made’. So a factory was opened in North Carolina. That’s how I ended up here. My parents travelled a lot so I was in boarding school. Basically my teens was in Virginia, DC and the Northeast, stuff like that. I graduated from NC State.”
“So how did you end up in the Bay Area?”
“We had some family friends that lived out here that said, ‘Why don’t you come out here and see how you like it?’ But with my background, moving here was a complete culture shock! You’re from here right?”
”Yeah, I’m from here.” I confirmed.
image by @patrck.lee
“Everything [here in California] is like complete culture shock. I think there are certain parts of this country you move to where get complete culture shock. For example, you move here or to LA or New York… or from here back to The South. It’s going to be complete culture shock.”
Who knows how long it takes to gain 8700 followers. Honestly, who cares? What I do know is that it doesn’t happen overnight. In today’s numbers 8700 followers on Instagram may not be Peter McKinnon-level huge but very respectable. So it goes almost without saying that it’s pretty amazing that Patrick has honed in on his style and knowledge of photography along with his passion for cycling and it’s only been five years. For Patrick this has turned into a life changing experience not only for his health but how he sees the world in general.
“I was diagnosed with hypertension when I was 30. My knees start to give out on me when I run. So I needed to do something else. When I first got on the bike it brings me back to the country when I was a teen. If you think about the south you think of open fields, gravel roads, that’s how we used to ride when we were teens. We used to get from house to house crossing fields. Get your BMX or whatever the hell you have. It’s hot as hell. You’ve got dogs chasing you. That’s what it brings me back to.”
There is a connection that Patrick and I share in our childhoods. We both built a foundation of adventure, exploration and freedom by riding bikes as kids. We weren’t racing. We weren’t taking ourselves too seriously but the idea that our interaction with our environment completely changed due to our love for being on the bike was incredibly instrumental in developing our sense of self.
“I rode [bmx] from eleven to fifteen or [maybe] sixteen. It’s such a short time. It’s only five years but it’s also such a formative part of your life-”
Because you grow right!?” He continues, “What got me hooked is the childhood feeling. And then when I think back to that it’s being free. That’s what bike brings me back to. We need that more now. That’s what we need as adults. Once you hop on the bike it brings you back to that feeling as a kid. I don’t need music, nothing. All I need is wind, gears, road, the sound of birds. that’s all I need.
“It feels good being back on the bike.”
image by @patrck.lee
“People don’t understand that. I guess you have to connect back to certain feelings that you had.”
It would be an honest mistake to regard Patrick as a professional photographer. A mistake I’m sure he welcomes with open arms. But the reality is that, like a majority of people, he actually works a 9-to-5 as a Healthcare Process consultant and still has the duties of being a husband and a father. Regardless of profession, life requires all of us to wear multiple hats at one time. There’s no compromise for that.
“I’m lucky that I work from home a lot. I get a lot more freedom than what a lot of people would ever have. People [here] spend hours on their commute. I get up in the morning, like today, I put in a couple of hours of work [at home]… I manage my day so I can do things like have time with you today. Between work, kids, cycling I try to map all that out. I would love to be like, ‘You know what I just want to go out riding.’ And I have days like that.”
“My thing is, with work, I never show up one-time. I always show up early, like early-early. I think the earliest I can get to work is about 8:30 but I start at 9:00. So I always get to work at 8:30 for the most part.” I explained.
“Yeah you get there early.” Patrick adds.
“But on days that I close [at 11:00] I still get there at 8:30.”
“That’s a whole different mentality. Just because I start my day at 11:00 it doesn’t mean I drag myself to 11:00. You’re still getting up at the regular time and you’re filling that gap.”
”Yeah and it allows me to get on such a schedule that I know that I’m not going to be late. I’m not going to be late to pick up my son, I’m not gonna be late to work, I’m not going to be late to anything that I have to do. And then I go ride, I can go take pictures, I can do whatever I want to do in that time.”
The mind is unique. We all age every second, ever minute, every day and so on. But the mind only ages by consciousness and awareness. The journey we take in life informs our consciousness. Then we make the decision on how we use our experiences to influence our lives. Our values may change but our passions tend to grow.
“How feel getting older has informed your photography, riding all around aspect of what you do?”
“I care less. I think when you’re younger… I’ll speak for me. When I was younger I cared more about what people think. I was more conscious of what people think. I was trying to satisfy other people. As I’ve gotten older I’m just trying to satisfy myself. And really my immediate family. Once I had a kid I woke up and I was like ‘I’m not satisfying nobody. The kid is who I’m satisfying.’ I don’t care about what you think. If I’m posting and you don’t like it I don’t care what you think. But, the work, the passion, input more thought into it. It’s all with age.”
image by @patrck.lee
Patrick’s attention quickly fixates through the window of Blue Bottle towards the street. He scans the road and finds his car.
“You got a ticket?” I questioned.
“Na. I’m just keeping my eye to make sure because I know it’s like a few minutes past.”
”I’m notorious at cheating the parking meter at this point.”
image by @patrck.lee
There’s more than one perspective to everything. I personally try not to get caught up in the idea that my perspective is the best appreciation of my subject. But it is the most authentic version of the story that I can tell. My subject isn’t as literal as photography or writing. It’s life. It’s what we are doing every day. Photography is a the liaison between life, the photographer and the viewer.
“You want to get something that nobody is seeing. It’s more like the little thing. There’s another angle somewhere and when you capture it that’s when people are like, ‘Oh shit! I didn’t even see that.’” Patrick goes on.
“Thats the thing when you’re doing photography. You’re capturing things that no one else is seeing.” I added.
“So there’s so many things that we’re able to see. There’s so many angles to that one thing. Usually there’s that one thing where it’s like, ‘Whoa! Where did you even see that?’” - Patrick Lee. CT
