Mike McCartney, brother of Paul McCartney, visited Kent State on Thursday before his lecture in Trumbull County.

McCartney is a photographer born in Liverpool, England. He has been taking photographs since he was a child.

“It was an accident,” McCartney said. “I just took the photographs and never stopped taking them.”

McCartney grew up in an artistic household. However, he said it would have been completely different if his mother hadn’t died when he was 12, seeing as he grew up in an Irish-Catholic family.

“You would be talking to a politician McCartney or Father McCartney,” he said.

Being artistic ran in his family. Not only was his brother in a pop band but also his father. His father performed in a band called Jim Mac’s Band so the family could stay out of poverty.

“We weren’t very academic, so we focused on being artistic,” McCartney said.

Aside from taking photographs, McCartney was in a comedy group called “The Scaffold.” The group lasted 25 years, and then McCartney went back to photography.

“I love taking photographs,” McCartney said. “Photographs are waiting to be taken and all I do is take them — it’s that easy.”

McCartney gets his inspiration from “going with the flow.” He said he doesn’t look for a particular element to shoot. He said in life, “winging it is the only way.”

“As soon as you start preparing something, you’re putting the wrong emphasis on it — you’re not making it natural,” McCartney said.

In his work, McCartney tries to find humor in what’s around him. He said the most important component of his work is humor. He wants viewers to view his work with an open mind and heart.

“We were born with this defect called humor, it’s a fighting mechanism, so it’s a very important part in our lives, so it’s a very important part in what I do,” McCartney said.

Contact Marissa Eisenbrei at [email protected].