UPDATE: Mentana Project Models

UPDATE: I am pleased to announce that we have EIGHT months out of the year completed! We have a few others who still need to get their photos taken, but we are nearing the completion of the first leg of our journey. WE WANT YOU TO BE A MODEL. There is still time and we won't stop at 12. We are hoping to wrap up our photoshoots by the end of August so that we can begin the layout, design, and production of the calendar. 

We have a variety of models, so now is your chance to be a voice to your community and more importantly to yourself. Step outside of your box, and meet guys from all across Montana. 

5k Milestone for MENtana Project!

We've had a lot of interest. How much interest you ask? We've had over 5,000 views in one month! Thank you for all of your support.

Interested in the Mentana Calendar Project? You too can be part of the project. We are continue to accept models. We've had some amazing photo shoots, some epic stories, press coverage, excitement, and bolstered confidence and self esteem through the project.  Share your story. Get involved and become a model for this sexy and sultry calendar that supports your community!

Sign up here

Meet Stopher Gehring

Water has always been a powerful symbol to me. I have fond memories of the ocean, the Seattle rains, and water is the element of Scorpio.  It represents emotion, depth, and change. In high school I had always been very body conscious. I would journal every day and in each entry I would include my weight.  For years I tracked my weight and struggled with a mild eating disorder.

As I grew older I learned the skills to overcoming my eating disorder.  I learned how to have a positive body image and how be critical of the media and all that they were telling me I needed to be. I put faith in the media’s portrayal of gay men—mimicking their fashions, styles, and most importantly their bodies. It was intoxicating to think that this industry didn’t care that I was gay. You could be gay and accepted, but you need to fit this standard. I never lived up to that standard.

 I always felt my body could be better. I could be bigger. I could be more sculpted. I should be hairless (I waxed to compensate). I should be tall. I should be stoic. I should be unfeeling and unscathed. I was none of these things and it felt empty.

Posing in front of the camera today I picked my element water, the element of which I am most comfortable in.  The shower was a safe space for me. It was my own personal baptism and confessional—no one to judge me, no one to be critical of my appearance. Terry asked me during the interview for the project what I had in mind and I told him that I had always felt comfortable in the water and would really like to do a shoot that involves my element.

I had brought my partner along to the photo shoot. It was an amazing experience getting to pose for my partner while Terry silently clicked away on his camera. 

It was strange at first having two men watch me shower (one being my partner, and the other Terry-- a friend prior to the project-- it still felt strange). I had never let anyone just watch me shower. This was the most vulnerable I had ever been. I had brought in an audience to watch me in my sanctuary and it was beautiful to share.

The most eye opening experience was sitting down with both my partner and my friend and looking at the raw photos. All the while I was posing for Terry and shamelessly flirting with my partner while they watched me shower I had no idea how I looked.  It was empowering to have my peers sharing and showing a beauty that I never get to see of myself.  I was surprised with many of the photos that Terry and my partner found to be attractive, beautiful, and interesting—something I would have never considered beautiful about myself was recognized by others and in doing so and experiencing that I found a beautiful piece of myself that I have been missing out on. I'm forever grateful for this experience. 

Local Press Coverage

UPDATE: Check out the local ABCFOXMONTANA news coverage of the Mentana Project! PRESS COVERAGE. We will continue posting models as Terry finishes with the raw photos. We are still accepting models. Register here if you are still interested and would like to be contacted about becoming a model. Also make a donation to keep the project in production. Any donation amount is greatly appreciated, even if it's just a dollar. Donate here. 

Meet William Matross

Size kept most people away.  While many are concerned about homophobia, I’ve never felt its sting. Instead, I’ve felt the heart crushing effects of obesophobia. We grow up in a culture where fast food and pre-prepared meals are cheaper than the healthy alternative, yet we shame people whose BMI puts them in the obese category. I was the typical fat kid, picked last for nearly any activity, invited to social events only as another body or out of some press from parents to make sure I was included. Once there, I was left to talk with the adults while the kids played. When I was with my “friends” I made fun of myself, cutting myself down to lessen the hurt when other people did it, which only invited them to try harder to hurt me.  

Unlike most of my peers, I was extremely young when puberty set in. I had a nice “treasure trail” by the time I was ten. My precocious body provided kids a new way to tease and new terms like man-boy were thrown at me with so much vile hatred that I feared going to places like the public pool. When I did go, I would wear my trunks there and kept a shirt on. I’d even went so far as to shave everything wispy strand off in order to fit what I felt was normal. I tried to keep everything smooth from my face to my toes, but eventually it was too difficult to upkeep and I eventually gave up.

My desperate attempts to fit in didn’t stop at keeping my body hair at bay. Not understanding anything about how metabolism works, I started eating less. Not in a healthy sense of cutting back my portions, but going whole days without food. I was happy if I could get a few days on a meal or two. I was certain that by denying myself food, the thing that I blamed for my size, I could get thin. And if I was thin then I deserved to be liked. I deserved to be loved. Unfortunately, when I starved myself, I damaged my already genetically poor metabolism. When starving didn’t work, I tried every fad diet my parents went on. Every time one failed, I treated myself like a failure. I hated my body and there were nights I would cry myself to sleep wishing I would die in my sleep and not waste any more space.

I spent so much of my life trying to be what I thought everyone else wanted me to be, that somewhere along the line I forgot who I was. It has taken thirty-five years, but I am finally coming out of the biggest closet of my life—coming out as me. The last year has been filled with little coming outs, opening up about my past and the events that shaped who I am today and being comfortable in my own skin. I have felt enough hate in my life and I am done fueling the flames. This project has given me another way that I can be me, by removing the most mundane way to hide myself. We all wear masks, but sometimes we have to put the mask away and be proud of who we are.

I put on faces to hide from the pain

I put on faces to keep me sane

I put on masks

For anyone who asks

the Truth