Please join us at the Tower Theatre OKC on Monday, August 27th from 6-8pm to celebrate the opening of our next SixTwelve Gallery at Tower Theatre show by Matt Payne - Enkereri’s Windows: A Visit to Kenya’s Enkereri School above the Masai Mara. (Showing August 27 - October 26)

In July of 2018, while on Safari in Kenya and Tanzania, Matt visited the Enkereri School in the mountains above the Masai Mara as part of a cultural enrichment program. What he found at the school moved him beyond any adventure in the savannah below. The school is part of the philanthropic arm of the travel company Abercrombie and Kent. "My visit was short and while a joyful one, emotionally conflicting. 'Before the school was built, class was held under a tree,' said our guide Fred as he walked us around the various classrooms. Such a thought was remarkably humbling and hard to imagine. 'The school’s newly constructed library doesn’t have books yet…' he continued… And I was annoyed my iPhone didn’t work.

My images are intended to reflect that conflict of emotion, the needs of others, and a reminder that there are vast differences between our culture and others across the world. A world a part and anywhere in the world at once…"

Matt Payne is an Emmy-nominated filmmaker, an award-winning travel photographer and writer, public speaker and adventurer. He is the travel editor for 405 Magazine in Oklahoma City, the producer of the television show Mosaic Oklahoma and is a contributing writer and photographer to Travel Age West, themanual.com, vagabondish.com, Communities Digital News and many other travel publications. Matt is an adjunct professor at Oklahoma City University and travels the Midwest, inspiring audiences with talks covering a range of topics from travel writing and photography to screenwriting. Matt’s wildly popular Instagram account Matt Payne Travel Photography Instagram celebrates 13.5k engaged followers and grows daily. 

In 2015, Matt and his wife moved to Oklahoma after 15 years in Los Angeles where Matt worked in the film and television business episodes of hits shows like Vegas and Defenders for CBS and TNT’s Memphis Beat. He was also part of the staff 24 and Without a Trace.  

Matt’s awards include a 2018 Emmy nomination for the project OETA Foundation project “RARE,” the Society of Professional Journalism’s first and third place awards for Magazine photography and the 2018 PBS Special Achievement Development Award for his television show Mosaic Oklahoma. Matt is a member of The Writer’s Guild of America, Society of American Travel Writers and sits of the board of directors of the Oklahoma City Zoological Society.