gary ashley

These photographs are from a project by Gary Ashley about the world of Elvis impersonators. He started shooting it in 1993 and continued on and off, while working on others, until some time in 2001. Gary said that he initially started the project out of curiosity, but as time went on and he took more trips to Memphis he became obsessed. He went from being an outsider to a loyal fan, and would come back each year during Memphis Week (usually coinciding with the anniversary of Elvis' death, which occurred August 16th, 1977). Most of the photographs in this series were made in Memphis during those times, with just a handful of them coming from Las Vegas and other places.