Editor’s Note: In each issue we will cover stories of Kerr alumni and what they have done after high school. As the first in the series, we hope with this story to show current students the different paths one can take after graduation.
Even when she attended Kerr, Ashley Canright was always artistic. Fortunately, she never outgrew it. Canright’s early passion for art was fueled by her interest in fashion, photography, hair, and makeup, among other things. After high school, she decided to pursue a career in modeling since it was another way to express herself artistically.
Canright’s modeling aspirations started when she made a Model Mayhem account as an amateur photographer. After doing a few photo shoots with various models, she began to realize that communicating and conveying her ideas to the models was very difficult. She decided to make a Model Mayhem account as a model, wanting to get on the other side of the lens and experience how other photographers would communicate with her.
“[My] model account just happened to be a lot more popular than the photographer one, so I decided to do more modeling and everything just seemed to work out great after all,” Canright said.
Canright hasn’t attended any fashion or modeling courses; she learns purely from experience.
“I’ve only been modeling since April 2010, but this is pretty much all I do now,” she said.
Canright has modeled for many agencies, including Visible Changes, Paul Mitchell, and Gin Martini. She also has done photoshoots with photographers from Model Mayhem and has modeled for the MUSE Boutique in Downtown Houston.
“I work with about 20 plus non-exclusive talent agencies,” she said. “Whenever there is an assignment or event in my area, they email and call me to let me know and get me on board for the event as soon as possible.”
Though Canright is not pursuing her dreams through a traditional college education at age 19, she hopes to work toward her goal of starting her own promotional modeling agency.
“Eventually I want to at least be featured in a magazine and be a spokesmodel in a commercial,” Canright said. “Once I am too old to model, I want to start up my own modeling agency so I can recruit people, because that is just extremely fun.”
