Caroll Taveras is ageless and is a native New Yorker.

MOSSLESS: A few years back you ran a temporary old-school portrait studio. What started the idea?
CAROLL TAVERAS: It was an idea that had been brewing in my head for years. Inspired by the portraits of Peruvian photographer Martin Chambi, who had a portrait studio in Cuzco from 1920 through the 1940s. In January 2009 I was offered a storefront in downtown Brooklyn by Art Assets, which I had about 2 weeks to set up. This dream of mine to have a store front ‘photo studio’ was now suppose to come together within a couple of weeks. It was pretty crazy, but also amazing being able to pull it off that quickly.

ML: How has it grown since then?
CT: It’s actually been a slow process since then. It had originally been scheduled to travel to Berlin after Brooklyn but the funding fell through since it was right in the middle of the whole financial bust. Last month I set up the studio at our gallery in Chelsea for a little over a week. That was great, but different from the studio in Brooklyn. I have a few surprises in store for this summer so stay tune to it coming around again.

ML: What are your favorite type of people to photograph?
CT: I love photographing teenagers. There’s something really beautiful in the way they carry themselves. A sort of sensual awkwardness and curiosity.

ML: You founded F.L.O.A.T. Gallery together with Meagan Ziegler-Haynes. What is a pop-up gallery and what’s the best thing about running one? 
CT: Well, we don’t really like the term pop-up gallery. We never really saw ourselves that way. When we initially opened F.L.O.A.T in Brooklyn about 7 months ago we were originally going to be in the space 6 months to a year. It was a donated space, but the property was sold so we began looking for another location. It wasn’t our intention of having a ‘floating’ gallery. It just happened, really.