Meet Jesse Hummel

We recently connected with Jesse Hummel and have shared our conversation below.

Jesse, we’re thrilled to have you sharing your thoughts and lessons with our community. So, for folks who are at a stage in their life or career where they are trying to be more resilient, can you share where you get your resilience from?

Coming to terms with PTSD, major depressive disorder, and chronic insomnia has been challenging and continues to be a major influence and my highest priority to this day. My mental health journey started similar to anyone else that has found the strength to survive themselves. Everything in my life got unimaginably more painful before I began to see results.

Today I start each day knowing that I already faced the most dificult challenge of my life. In 2014, I spent the year with Dr. Paul Harig Jr. in a cognitive reconstruction program that he personal developed for me. Prior, I had lived a self destructive adult life after serving five years active duty in the United States Coast Guard.

With knowledge and experience, a person becomes aware of their capability. The majority of individuals that enlist in the armed forces are living proof of what they are capable of in extreme situations. Unfortunatly the evidence and self awareness doesn’t translate well in civilian life. I was no longer in 40 foot sea waves with my shipmates responding to a distress call. After my years of service I was alone in work and home enviroments that had little or no connections to the person that existed during those five years of service.

A true measure of my percerverience came to me in May of 2021, it was the first time I was able believe and tell my social worker that the best years of my life are ahead of me. I understand that the biggest story and most monumental acts in a veteran’s life, begin with asking help.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?

I am “Jesse Levi Hummel of Throvv”. That’s me and that is my brand. I specifically request that wording in all of my photo credits to make the search results meaningful. Throvv is the social media platforms, the Spotify channel, and even interchangeable with my name to a lot of people.

In 2020, I rigged my GMC Savana so that I could live it while traveling the country to create my art. Since then I defined a subgenre in photography, am featured in Howard Stern’s best of 2021, have published images in various outlets, recognized and rewarded by national brands, and most importantly belong to a community that accepts me.

I set the gold star standard for competitive axe throwing photography in 2020 and have continually grown as an artist redefining the very standards I set. Growth is the word that accounts best for the choices, behaviors, and attitudes that I gravitate towards in all areas of my life. The importance placed on this word is visually represented in the body of work that I have created in these most recent years.

I consider myself an artist over photographer, and the reasoning might not be what you would expect.

From my perspective the typical journey for people starting in photography can best be described as; a side hustle that became a means, that became a passion. An overwhelming number of people with cameras are predators. The hustle of maximizing minimums from equipment to skill, in hopes that a person can then pursue their true passions with the financial gains.

I know that is potentially a controversial statement for a lot of people, but it is likely the least of the offenses that I have committed in the photography space.

I rarely charge to photograph a competition or event, and I own all of my art.

That may not seem like a significant statement, but it is tremendous main character energy. Owning your art means many things, but most importantly to me it is the ability to photograph what I want, say no to photographing what others want, and the power to share my art however I choose.

There is another side of what owning all of my art means, but it’s also main character energy. The photography community feels that any act that does not result in financial compensation for time and equipment is an attack on the perceived dollar value of all photography.

I am an artist. I measure my success in how the creative process and the results fulfill and enrich my life. I am the wealthiest person I know, living in my van doing what I love to do.

If you know nothing about Elvis, know this. The King of Rock ‘n’ Roll’s depression, insecurities, and struggles stemmed from an industry forcing an artist to be a performer.

The most significant contributions from my formal art training came from art history courses. I learned that with few exceptions, the names of artists that we know today were not “successful” or appreciated among their peers or their contemporary art world. There are numerous factors for this, but I believe the most significant is that today’s household names were focused on creating their art and left little to no time for learning or caring about promoting themselves.

My advice to anyone that wants to be labeled artist instead of the act of creation they are exploring, learn what artists that were late in their careers had to say about success and fulfillment. The two outcomes often exist independently, and in opposition more frequently than we are lead to believe.

I am a self-proclaimed Agent of Chaos. I’ve walked away from shooting alongside ESPN televised gigs, major sport competitions, and other sought after opportunities behind a camera. I know the importance of saying no to compromising my creative and mental health journey.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

If there was indisputable proof that our time here is a predetermined arbitrary existence while we wait to ascend to an eternity of something better, there would be one religion and all of humanity would belong to it. There is no evidence of this, so I encourage people to value the finite time we have been given to find fulfillment that doesn’t hurt you or others.

How can folks who want to work with you connect?

The last four years I have documented the throwing sports with my cameras. It was a period of adventure and growth in art and life. It is also an invaluable four year case study of a community of passionate people in an emerging sport filled with successes and failures.

Currently I am in a transition period. I have applied everything that I have learned through my observations and engagements within this community of axe and knife throwers to build a competition that addresses the unrecognized success and well known failures of the leading competitive formats.

The conceptual work is complete, and I am now working to acquire the resources and talent that I believe will be the evolution of my brand Throvv and heighten the competitive throwing sport experience.

Have you ever thrown an axe or knife and enjoyed it beyond most things you’ve experienced? Do you have a skill set that would contribute to an online platform that is not unfamiliar, but doesn’t exist in the throwing sports? Do you enjoy disrupting markets and having a chapter in a story that might be fun to tell 20 years later when Throvv is a household name or at the very least a docuseries that people binge watch?

If yes to one or all of these questions find me on FB at Throvv or IG at ThrovvLLC.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: Throvvllc
• Facebook: Throvv

Image Credits

Photographs by Jesse Levi Hummel of Throvv