The Artist
I see the world
differently. Always
have.
I'm Tim Hanley — a Seattle photographer and digital artist living with severe colorblindness. I grew up in a world built on color I couldn't fully access, so I learned to rely on something else — light, structure, and the way a moment feels before it's understood.
Early on, someone told me I'd be better off trying to put lipstick on a pig than waste my time editing color photographs. That I should stick to black and white and leave color to people who could actually see it.
I bought the domain LipstickOnAPig.com that same week.
What started as defiance became discipline. And over time, that discipline became a way of seeing.
I don't build images the way most photographers do. I build them through relationship — how light shapes a face, how elements interact, how something feels before it's explained. Every composite I create comes from that process.
If you're a performer, a creator, or someone who wants more than just a photograph — this isn't about capturing how you look. It's about revealing something you didn't know was visible.
Photography isn't the only language I work in. I'm a philosopher, author, and songwriter — and the founder of Rain City Studios. My book, BEING: The Renaissance of Quantum Telos Idealism, asks the questions that photography can point to but not answer. It's available on Amazon. Some of my work finds its way there — to spaces I create, when photography alone isn't quite enough.
