In which a world-famous photojournalist turns his lens on the neighborhood children as they live their dreams on one magical night ….

 

 

Chad Hunt is one of BROAD STREET’s favorite people, as anyone who has picked up a copy of the magazine can tell. He’s a prizewinning photo journalist whose work has run in Time and other big glossies, but he’s always been supportive of little guys like us. His work graces two of our most memorable covers, and we featured his photo essay on soldiers’ lives in and after Afghanistan in our very first issue.

And now it’s Halloween, which for six years meant that Chad’s neighbors became his biggest fans.  He set up a studio on his front porch and made free portraits of the kids who came trick-or-treating.

The project grew to enormous proportions after Popular Photography published an article about what Chad was doing. In 2016, he photographed 325 people in just four hours.

“The line was down to the curb, and I hired three teenagers to give out candy so I could focus on pictures,” he says.

Read the full article here, with more portraits.

 

 

With porch portraits all the rage, parents — costumed and plain-clothesed — asked for pictures too. All part of the fun.

A repeat engagement for 2017 is a more than daunting prospect, especially without an assistant. Chad has announced that his Halloween activity this year will be limited to giving out candy.

But he’s wistful about missing the photo session.

“I’ve photographed some of these kids for six years in a row,” he notes.

 

 

And as he told Popular Photography, “Looking back, I realize that I have seen these kids grow up on my porch. What started as a simple gift to my community has turned into something much bigger.”

Those kids include his daughter, Isadora, whose costumes have evolved along with her personality and interests.

She was a bee for her very first trick-or-treating (with her parents dressed as beekeepers ), and in 2010 she was a cat.
It’s not just a child’s body that grows — self-images, fantasies, and aspirations grow too, and they find expression in the choice of costumes … from kitty cat to powerful psychic adolescent … or maybe Supergirl or a medieval knight.

So a more grown-up Isadora, for example, dressed as Eleven from Stranger Things in 2016.

 

On Chad’s porch, costumed children roared and smiled and stood proud with superpowers. Dreams bloomed in the flash of the camera’s light.

 

 

Not doing the porch photos this year, Chad admits, means he’ll miss the kids’ excitement and what the sessions have meant to him personally.

He points out the portrait of a wee Supergirl as one he simply had to take: “This girl was SO PROUD of her costume … and she was just beaming.*

*

 

We’re beaming too, Chad. Thanks for showing us our favorite selves.

*

Click here to see more porch portraits.

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Chad Hunt’s photographs have appeared in Time, Popular Mechanics, and The New York Times. His Afghanistan photographs received a Military Reporters and Editors Award and are in the permanent collection of the George Eastman House Museum. He lives in a small town in New Jersey.

Find Chad’s photojournalism and contact information on his website.

 

And don’t miss the family of beekeepers, when Chad and Angela took a baby Isadora around the neighborhood.

Chad, Angela, and Isadora, in the days before the porch.
True stories. Honestly.

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