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    Gordon Stettinius teaches at Virginia Commonwealth University and is a lifer in the photography industry. But in the last week, he has gotten a lot more notoriety for creating a project in conjunction with photographer Terry Brown that has gone viral. Stettinius laughs at the popularity. “I’ve been shilling for my work for 20 years and now this joke that has run amok has grown so quickly."

    And with good reason. As you can see from the picture here, Stettinius has put together a hilarious collection of portraits. Each picture features Stettinius rocking a wildly different hairstyle. Keep reading to learn about how it all came together.

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    He shot the beehive a couple of weeks later to rid himself of the curls. Walking out of the salon where he had just had his hair done, Stettinius ran into a friend of his mother's. "I didn't really have a series going on at that point, so that was a little difficult to explain what I was up to," says Stettinius.

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    His current exhibition is UnBound! at Candela Books + Gallery in Richmond, Virginia. It is an invitational and juried exhibition featuring 50 contemporary photographers, through July 21st.

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    Amazingly enough, Stettinius actually met his current girlfriend on the same day he did the combover shoot. "She gave me a few months to recover before we actually started to go out," he laughs. "My friends say, ‘She’s definitely a keeper if she can put up with that stuff.’” 

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    Clearly it was a good match as Stettinius' girlfriend has since contributed to the project. “She likes some of them," he says. "She did the dreadlocks for me.”

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    Some hairstyles are easier to put together than others. “My sons gave me the mohawk," says Stettinius. "The next morning, I got my photo taken."

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    The portraits have been included in museum exhibits in Houston and Santa Barbara. Says Stettinius: “We’re trying to do something that’s not the most important thing in the world, but we’re trying to put together a good project.”

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    Next: Epically Hilarious Photos Vol. 2

    “These are just archetypal hairstyles and then we try to build a character around them,” says Stettinius.  “I’ve got about 12 more of these before we call it a day. Two more years left, something like that.”

    For more information on Stettinius, check out his web site: candelabooks.com

    Sunburn, photographs by Chris McCaw, will be out in September but it can be purchased at candelaboooks.com already.