Search Results

Montreal-born, Nicolas Ruel was driven to photography by a deep-seated passion. “I was undeniably inhabited by it, and it compelled me to move forward, to discover.” Over seven + years he has worked on a major project called 8 secondes. The work began in 2007 and saw its completion in 2015. In 2009 Ruel exhibited Project 8 secondes at the Galerie Zone Orange in Montreal, the Thompson Landry Gallery in Toronto, and the Galerie Seine 51 in Paris. Ruel is fascinated with the fact that photography is both artistic and very technical. The project 8 secondes presented challenges in both areas. He wanted to “revisit the image of the world’s greatest cities.” His first city was Paris, followed by London. At first he planned on documenting 16 cities, but then as the project became bigger and bigger, it grew to 50 cities. Now, nearing the end of the project, he has decided to add 12 more. Ruel had been experimenting with long exposures prior to 8 secondes. He asserts in his artist statement, “This long exposure makes it possible to assemble key moments in a single take, analogous to the process of condensation in dreams. Thus, in this dolly shot, I translate the actions and spectacle of the city and its residents as I follow their unceasing movement.” As for the locations he seeks out, he says, “I am fascinated by transitory and transitional sites — places that in their nature and function incarnate motion and metamorphosis, such as ports, terminals, docks, highways, construction sites, churches, and stadiums.” Although everything in the eight-second exposure is in the scene, the resulting image is not a visual document but rather an artistic interpretation. It is a unique point of view and Ruel tries to imbue it with meaning and vision. The images have a sensuous quality and seem like dreams, moving pictures crystallized and condensed into one scene. Ruel calls these micro-métrages or micro movies. The ebb and flow of time is felt in each image. Ruel states, “Motion is at the heart of most of the images I create. The subject is constantly in motion. I’m in motion. The camera and the subject are in motion. The locations are iconic and revive images and feelings from the past. We have experience with what the world would look like if we could freeze 1/125 of a second. Ruel presents his vision of what the world would look like if we could freeze eight seconds. Although frozen in one frame, the motion and passing of time is clearly felt. On the technical side Ruel has a strong interest in modern industrial material. He has experimented with the metal printing process and took the bold move to print the 8 secondes project on large-format stainless steel plates. He refers to this as a flashback to the daguerreotype process where the image was printed on a polished copper plate. The stainless steel gives the image a reflective quality and brings to mind the initial name given to daguerreotypes: “the mirror with a memory.” Ruel considers himself very fortunate to be able to travel around the world and use the medium of photography to be creative. He states, “Every day I am amazed behind the magic that is photography. We live in a special time — one of the best times I could be born is right now.“ His advice is to find a way to express your dreams in a very unique way and go for it. He says, “Shoot and shoot. You never know how far you can go. Be open to different things — even things that are not connected to your kind of photography. Look for collaborations with artists in other fields, such as painters, sculptors, architects.” Ruel has been applying his own advice in the past few years, the most notable example being his collaboration with the French fashion house Maison Jean-Paul Gaultier. For Ruel, the most important part of this collaboration was “sharing a dream or a vision.” This is something we can apply to any kind of photography and, by doing so, we will elevate our art to another level. We featured Nicolas Ruel in our Winter 2013: Travel Photography - Issue #39 - Get it in PRINT HERE. See more of Nicolas' work : www.nicolasruel.com #NicolasRuel #travelphotography #Montreal #photoart #longexposure #fineartphotography #experimentation #canadianphotography #motionphotography

Travel photography and photography in general has opened the world to me. It has become a reason to wake up at dawn and set off to see a misty sunrise behind a Buddhist temple, or to stay out late in the Scottish Highlands to capture a rescue mission in the mountains with a long exposure. The potential to take my favourite photograph tomorrow has, for the last four years, been my driving motivation to experience and document the world around me. All the gear involved with the act of photographing makes being a backpacker at the same time almost an oxymoron. Known notoriously by throngs of other tourists as the ones with the most luggage, photographers are undoubtedly weighed down by gear when out taking photos. In 2011 when I began a five-month journey across China and Southeast Asia, I packed more than most. In an 80-litre backpack I had four lenses, three cameras, and a flash, a laptop, a mini tripod, backup equipment, batteries, chargers, and more memory cards than I could count. My gear took up more space than my clothing and, though I knew the weight was cumbersome, it wasn’t until I received an invitation to explore Northern Thailand’s Mae Hong Son Province on a motorbike that I made the conscious effort to lighten my load. I also had the opportunity to hike the Great Glen Way, a five-day, 114-kilometre footpath from Inverness to Fort William, Scotland. Carrying everything I needed for a single week in October, I traveled using nothing more than a 35-litre backpack with a tripod and tent strapped to its top. The Great Glen Way took me to places that were accessible only by foot or bike, officially off the beaten path. Packing more than I needed wasn’t an option. The benefits of packing light are four-fold: the first advantage being carry-on luggage. If at all possible, I carry my most valuable belongings on my person on long-haul bus rides, air flights, and even car trips. Keeping an eye on your gear during transit is safer than using luggage locks. Placing your camera in a small protective bag before you place it in a day bag or a backpack hides it. Petty theft happens abroad and at home and keeping a low profile by not carrying a great deal of gear around is another way of keeping your equipment safe. Especially when arriving at a new destination, it is great to be carrying only a backpack. You can then explore without first having to stop at a hotel to unload your luggage. Carrying only one or two lens options and a single camera, I can act quickly when I see a scene or moment I’d like to photograph. If I had all of my equipment with me, I would ask myself which camera I should use, which lens would be best, and whether I should use a flash. All of these questions could slow down my response to a potential photograph and might mean that I don’t capture the scene at all. Traveling light is going to mean different things to different photographers. Your lens choices, camera choice, and any other gear you use are going to change the aesthetic of your images. No lens is going to be great for everything and travel photography is as diverse as the world itself. Think ahead: Where are you going? What do you plan on shooting? Landscapes? Portraits? Architecture? Answering questions like these honestly will help narrow down your kit significantly and give you the flexibility and benefits of traveling light. Here is a Packing Sample list, as an example of all I took with me on my two-week hiking trip to Scotland: 1 T-shirt 1 Long-sleeved tight shirt 2 Pairs of hiking socks 1 Pair of sleeping socks 1 Light sweater 1 Heavy sweater 1 Raincoat 1 Pair of rain pants 1 Pair of hiking pants/tights 1 Hat Underwear Running shoes/Hiking shoes Wallet/Passport/Etc. Toiletries 1 Sleeping bag 1 Sleeping pad 1 Flashlight 1 Tent 35L Backpack Cotton sling day bag Soft camera-shaped case that fits into a day bag or backpack 1 DSLR 24mm Lens 85mm Lens 1 Tripod 2 Batteries 1 Charger 1 Power adaptor 5 8GB CF cards 1 Small waterproof case for CF cards This article originally appeared in our Winter Issue in 2013. Get it in print - HERE #TaylorRoades #travelphotography #travel #HowTo #backpacking #womeninphotography #Traveltips #phototips #canadianphotographer

Scott Conarroe believes that the environment “offers insights into the true values and psychology of a culture.” He acknowledges that each one of us has an impact and inherent responsibility for both our own personal surroundings as well as the environment at large. However, his photographic mission in his By Sea project is not about judgment or making a political statement regarding our infringement on the environment. “I didn’t want By Sea to be an inventory of climate change vignettes or [a] map of the coastline,” Conarroe states in an email interview from Limburg, Belgium, where he worked on a project about how comparable regions deal with their industrial heritages. Instead, his approach to the project is analogous to an observational essay. “The coastline was a really useful device for discussing the way we inhabit North America,” he states. “Along a single elevation, it spans the breadth of this civilization from circumpolar to subtropical regions. Through cities and sprawl and unadulterated landscape, sea level marks a visible edge where the land we can live on abuts a vast plane where we can’t. In a sense, the coastline illustrates that our dominion has limits.” With his By Sea project, Conarroe wanted to achieve a parallel imagery of timelessness and in-the-moment engagement. To evoke this ambiance, he shot his images by using long exposures, just before dawn and just after dusk. “In long exposures, when the light changes colour by the second, the light blends and softens and a degree of uncertainty is introduced into the process. I close the shutter when things move around in my frame, and when they become still or absent I open it again. In the end, my pictures are shadowless, slightly off-colour views that I think of as midway between an impressionist painting and a schematic diagram,”. By Sea is a rejoinder to By Rail (2008), Conarroe’s series about railways in Canada and the United States. He says, “On one hand, the rail system describes the vastness of this (Anglo- America) geo-cultural bloc simply; on the other, it illustrates both our ambitious course of development and the fear that our best days might be past. By Sea looks at the coastline perimeter of the same civilization.” Conarroe moves from recording the history of the postindustrial environment in By Rail, to a prescient geographical documentation of periphery waterscapes randomly selected throughout North America. “I like the idea that the North America we know today grew from the moment of first contact when Europeans first stepped onto the shore, and that this new era By Sea alludes to is also slipping up past the tide line. I like thinking this culture’s past and future are bookended by episodes at the water’s edge, just like the physical territory is bound by distinct coastlines,” Conarroe says. Conarroe keeps his choice of equipment simple, using a Wista RF 4 x 5 field camera, a 135mm Nikkor lens, a 127mm Schneider lens, and Kodak 160 NC film. (NC film features finer grain properties for image enlargement.) While Conarroe’s creative path did not begin with a camera, having tried his hand at creative writing and printmaking, his formal photographic studies, which include a BFA from the Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design (ECIAD) and an MFA from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design (NSCAD), have stood him in good stead. In 2010, Conarroe’s work was featured in Canada’s pavilion at Shanghai’s World Expo; as well, he was named one of the year’s top emerging 30 photographers by Photo District News. His mentors include Jim Bruekelman, teacher at ECIAD; Alvin Committer and Bob Bean, teachers at NSCAD; Geoffrey James, who, according to Conarroe, “treated me like a colleague when I was just some guy with a camera”; John Mannion at Light Work/Community Darkrooms (Syracuse); and Stephen Bulger, who “seems to have limitless reserves of encouragement, integrity, and sound advice.” Conarroe’s advice to aspiring photographers is simple, succinct, and practical: “Do something to propel your practice every day.” See more of Scott Conarroe's work at: www.scottconarroe.com #travelphotography #ScottConarroe #longexposure #photographycanada #climatechangephotography #landscape #landscapephotography #canadianphotographer #analogfilm

The Timescape series comprises film strip-like narratives made between 2001 and 2003, marking a particular measure of time and space. Shot on the fly, during a walk, on a train ride, or from a car window, each strip maps a small journey: some a daily routine, others more unusual and of greater significance. Each Timescape, in its own way, seeks to fix a passage of time and place, while at the same time expressing a sense of dislocation and transition. The photographs in this series were created using a Holga toy camera. I came upon this camera over ten years ago and was fascinated by its modest construction. The camera seemed to harken back to pinhole or other forms of early photography when our tools were simpler. It amazed me that this primitive device made out of plastic, with a plastic lens, could produce images of such beauty. I soon discovered that the Holga had its limitations: lens distortion and light flare among them. However, these qualities seemed to coincide well with something I was seeking to express in my work at the time, something ephemeral and dreamlike. For many years before making the Timescapes I was working with regular and super 8 film, scrolling the film through a hand-cranked editor and examining the still frames within the story, while embracing them as part of a greater narrative. One day while viewing my Holga negatives, which I had left uncut, I discovered that one of my 120 negative strips seemed to unfold like a film. In re-examining the negatives I had shot over previous years, I realized that a number of them emerged in this cinematic way. With this idea in mind, I began to consciously shoot a roll of film with the awareness of forming a narrative, sensitive to how one frame might speak to the next to create a story. Working with multiple images expressed a sense of groundlessness that I wanted to communicate. By holding the camera away from my body and shooting as I moved through the landscape, I strove to evoke the feeling of searching for place and identity. As curator Karen Henry wrote about the Timescapes in the exhibition Landscape and Light, “the accumulation of multiple frames reveals an effort to grasp something impossible to hold onto.” My work is informed by a fascination with the relationship between the still and the moving image: examining how the photographic still is a moment lifted from the flowing stream of time. In exploring this relationship over the years, I have worked simultaneously in photography and video. My work in each has informed the other. My video When the Cricket Sings (2007), shot in Shanghai, depicts a night walk through a shop-crowded street with brightly illuminated interiors. Like the Timescapes, the Cricket video is shot with the camera moving. On this Shanghai street, the video passes steadily along the sidewalk exposing a series of brief vignettes as shoppers buy food, examine electronics, or eat bowls of noodle soup. As the promenade continues, the lit shops are separated by darkness, and the night becomes the black rebate that divides one frame from another in a film or negative strip. In unraveling the Timescapes, it became clear to me that they marked an important passage in my work, linking my love and fascination with the still and the moving image, and foretelling of an ongoing exploration of duration, memory, and narrative. See more of Sara' work at: www.sara-angelucci.ca This article originally appeared in PhotoEd Magazine's Winter Issue 2008. #canadianphotography #SaraAngelucci #Holga #womeninphotography #alternativeprocess #analogfilm #filmexploration #experimentation

Naomi Harris set off on the Trans Canada Highway in the summer of 2011 in a car she bought on eBay. She had a Canada Council for the Arts grant for her project Oh Canada! Her plan was to drive from coast to coast, photographing Canadians — the ordinary and the extraordinary. We asked her how she decided who to approach and how she made her approaches. “Frankly, if you live in Canada, you are a Canadian, right?” she replied. “I simply said I was doing a road trip from coast to coast to make portraits of Canadians and could I kindly photograph them and include them in the project.” Harris explains, “I wanted to try to be as inclusive as possible of people from all walks of life and make sure the project wasn’t just a bunch of white, apple-cheeked people.” She had an ambitious idea: start in Victoria and keep heading east; get to events such as the Spock Days festival in Vulcan, Alberta; photograph the oldest living Canadian (Pearl Lutzko of Ituna, Saskatchewan); and end the trip in St John’s, Newfoundland by Labour Day. “Most of my subjects I just stumbled upon along the way, which to me is the nicest way to meet people,” she says. Harris’s portraits have a gravitas and dignity, presented with respect and a calm clarity. They suggest stories we would like to hear and people we would like to talk to, about the very different ways we are or have become Canadians. Through her images and between her words, you get a sense that Harris cherishes the stories she’s been told. She met Ruth Kells, now 92, at a veterans’ event in Halifax, and now counts her as a dear friend. When Ruth was 18 in the early 1940s, she signed up to the RCAF as a wireless operator. For a woman to go to the war in Europe, she’d have to be 21, so she worked from Canada and travelled after the war, a bold ambition for a woman at that time. “She even had a motorbike!” says Harris. “Part of my experience as a photographer is that you get to spend a brief moment in time with people and capture it in a photograph, but then move on to the next adventure,” Harris shares. Another road-side acquaintance that has stuck with her – and still travels with her now – was the result of choosing a back road in Saskatchewan. “I looked on a map and saw that a hamlet called Kandahar wasn’t too far away. Since I would never go to Kandahar, Afghanistan, why not go to Kandahar, Canada? There were two different routes I could take, one on a highway that took me a little bit out of the way or one that was more direct, but on a dirt road that went through the Poor Man First Nation Reserve. If you know Saskatchewan roads at all, you know that they are the worst in the nation; paved or unpaved, your shocks are going to take a beating. I decided to take the unpaved but more direct route.” Halfway along that road, driving alone in the baking sun, Harris saw a hitchhiker. She’d never picked up a hitchhiker before. She says, “Maybe it was the heat and the fact that the reservation was 15 kilometres away, but something urged me to give this man a lift. I think he was surprised too when the car backed up, the window rolled down, and this lone woman offered him a lift. He quietly got into the car. We made small talk and, when we got to the turn off, I asked if I could come and photograph his family, to which he replied, ‘Sure.’ I had never been on a reservation before; I don’t know too many people from Toronto who have been. But it was honestly sadder than anything I expected: bleak pre-fab homes with no landscaping, dirt roads, broken down cars in yards among other garbage, stray dogs roaming the streets and, to top it off, a tornado had torn through the community the summer before. While I waited for his parents to return home so I could photograph the family, I began talking with the hitchhiker’s younger sisters. Out of nowhere this horrible, tick-ridden, dreadlocked, muddy, wretched creature waddled up to us. Instinctively they kicked it away, to which I was like ‘Whoa! What are you doing?’ They simply replied it was a ‘Rez’ dog, so it didn’t matter. I wanted to prove to them that under that horrible coat was a sweet creature so I went to my car to get some scissors and began giving the dog a haircut. She immediately rolled over in submission and let me cut off all of the matted hair. I asked the girls to get a bucket of warm, soapy water so we could give her a bath. By the time we were done, they were all excited by how sweet this dog was. Underneath that mess was a purebred Shih Tzu. She had a cherry eye that required surgery and scabs from the ticks but seemed okay otherwise.” Harris asked if she could take the dog with her, as no one owned it. “As I drove away, I felt guilty that I was taking a dog away with me instead of being able to do something for the family I just left.” Her new four-legged friend Maggie turned out to be anaemic and heavily pregnant. Harris consulted a vet and, through a friend she met on Tumblr, found “an incredible woman who said she’d keep Maggie, help deliver the puppies, find homes for all of them, and then deliver Maggie to me when I was done the trip. Just before I pulled out of Winnipeg, Maggie gave birth to six puppies … and true to the woman’s word, all the puppies found good homes.” Two months later after the end of the roadtrip, Maggie was flown to Toronto. Harris picked her up from the airport. “I set the carrier down in the airport parking lot, opened the hatch, and Maggie flew out! Confused from the ordeal of the trip, she looked around and suddenly there was a distinct look of recognition in her eyes, like ‘It’s you, the one who rescued me!’ She jumped up and down and licked me excitedly.” A chance meeting in a remote town and a connection online: these networks of people and fate reveal the ways we intersect, support, connect, and contact strangers, friends, and family. This is a part of what Oh Canada! shares. Has she finished? Did Harris find Canada in her coast-to-coast adventures? “I would say it isn’t a complete project. I’d like to return to the road again sometime in the future and fill the gaps in and go to places I didn’t get a chance to visit the first time round.” We asked what advice she would give to new and emerging photographers. What has she learned, and what would she pass on? “How we choose to photograph people [has] repercussions. We also have a responsibility to our subjects to share their stories and likeness in a way they would want to be portrayed. I tend to like to photograph ‘real’ people and, in a way, that isn’t always the most flattering. But I think pictures can have elements of peculiarity, awkwardness, and absurdity to them… it’s your intentions that are important. Are you capturing a bizarre moment in time or are you intentionally trying to mock or ridicule your subject? I think photographers have to ask themselves what their intent is, and what the consequences of their photos will be. I feel like I’m still learning about myself all the time. Like right now I’m trying to figure out how much longer I can sustain this lifestyle. Don’t get me wrong, I love photography and the experiences I’ve had through it, but financially this isn’t sustainable anymore. Now whether that means I’ll get a day job but continue doing photography in the form of personal projects remains to be seen. But this is the best piece of advice I can give to young photographers. That you don’t have to make a living out of being a photographer, because surviving off of photography alone is really, really hard. There is no shame in having a ‘real’ job to make ends meet. In fact, it can be a plus, because it’s easier to be creative when you aren’t in debt or stressed out about how to pay your rent.” naomiharris.com This story and other great Canadian photo stories can be found in our Spring/ Summer 2017 issue, CELEBRATING CANADA. Get it in beautiful print, HERE. *** Maggie is very popular on instagram : @maggiewhereyouat #NaomiHarris #portraiture #portraitphotography #womeninphotography #photographycanada #canadianphotography #canadianphotographer #peoplephotography

“These photographs will either serve as tools -of preservation or live on as legacies of what -unique and astounding places we once had. -My fingers are crossed for the first option.” ---- TJ Watt TJ Watt offers an invitation. The invitation is not to look at the two-dimensional surface of his work but to walk in, place yourself deep within the photograph, smell the fresh, moist air, and stare up at 1000-year-old trees in one of British Columbia’s old-growth forests. Watt creates space for the viewer to enter by using leading lines from the foreground that weave the viewer through the trees and deep into these ancient forests. There is a figure in many of his images to give the work a sense of scale and to encourage viewers to see themselves in the image. There is a hyper-realism to these richly textured works, accentuated by the sharp focus and majestic light. Watt encourages us to linger over the details, as our eyes explore the textures and hues of the trees, along with the mosses, lichens, and other plants that have taken root on the surface of the bark. Looking at these photographs gives one a sense of the fertile ground that nourishes these plants and the complex ecosystem that has evolved naturally for thousands of years. The endangered old-growth forests on Vancouver Island are some of the last remaining temperate rainforests left on Earth. Watt describes his exploration deep into British Columbia’s backwoods as transcendent. “When you walk through these forests, there is a different rhythm and a rekindling of a connection to something more primal, complex, magical,” he says. “I’m always amazed by the scale; trees the size of your living room, everything is draped with mosses. It’s like stepping into another world. It’s peaceful and humbling.” One of Watt’s goals is to capture the scale and serenity of the forest and bring it back so that others can appreciate the forest’s beauty and complexity. “If I can’t physically take someone there, then the next best thing is to allow them to step into the scene through the window of a photograph. You are much more likely to stand up and try to protect a special place if you can sense it, feel it, and develop an emotional connection with it,” Watt claims. British Columbia’s old-growth forests are under threat. Watt uses existing satellite imagery to understand the impact of logging, farming, and urbanization. “According to 2006 data, approximately 75 percent of Vancouver Island’s productive old-growth forests have been logged, including 90 percent of the valley bottoms where the biggest trees grow and the richest biodiversity is found,” he explains. The Upper Walbran Valley is home to some of the finest remaining stands of endangered old-growth red cedar in British Columbia. Footpaths wind through the most magnificent ancient forests. But the forest is far from safe, and Watt states that “active logging is taking place nearby.” Logging the last remnants of old-growth habitat has implications for science, medicine, and countless species of animals and insects, not all of which are known. Watt uses photography as a way of mapping and recording how plant and animal species rely on these areas for survival. Watt also uses photography to educate viewers about nature’s life cycle. He points out that a forest contains a continuous circle of life. “The big cedar has broken off and died, and its hollow stump can provide shelter for animals like cougars, wolves, deer, and bears. The log will also store large amounts of water in the dry summer months, which helps new trees to sprout,” he says. Watt also points out some of the misconceptions about the forest: “It’s a human bias that if we don’t use the tree for lumber then it just goes to waste, when in fact, the tree continues to play an important role for plants and animals even when it dies.” Watt is a co-founder of the Ancient Forest Alliance, a grassroots environmental organization working to protect British Columbia’s endangered old-growth forests and forestry jobs. Some of his photographs tell the story of the destruction and devastation that is occurring in the ancient rainforests he is trying to protect. He uses photography as a way to educate, inform, and inspire governments and citizens to act. Surprisingly, Watt is not entirely against logging. However, he wants a re-examination of logging practices and government protection of ancient forests. Currently, only about 6 percent of the Island’s original productive old-growth forests are protected within parks, and he would like to see this number increase. “There is an inevitable transition to logging second-growth forests as the old-growth runs out. We desperately need to protect what little we have left to ensure the survival of endangered species, fight climate change, and for the simple fact that these are some of the most magnificent ecosystems in the world” he suggests. According to Watt, “Old-growth forests support a larger diversity of plant and animal species, whereas the much younger and simpler second-growth tree plantations typically lack a complex ecological structure.” For example, “Old-growth forests have trees of all ages, anywhere from one day old to possibly more than a thousand years old, which creates a multi-layered canopy. As older trees die and fall over, it allows more light to reach the forest floor and nourish plants, whereas the even-aged second growth stands block out much of the light, allowing fewer plants to grow.” Watt uses photographic comparisons to illustrate his point: “You see a significant difference between a forest that’s been evolving for thousands of years and a tree plantation. These photographs will either serve as tools of preservation or live on as legacies of what unique and astounding places we once had. My fingers are crossed for the first option.” We featured TJ WATT and this article in our FALL 2011: Our Changing Planet – Issue 32. If you’re looking for eco photography inspiration, you can find it HERE. Check out what TJ Watt has been up to lately at: www.tjwatt.com To learn more about the Ancient Forest Alliance, go to www.ancientforestalliance.org #TJWatt #nature #ecophotographycanada #canadianphotography #BritishColumbia

PhotoED Magazine receives a LOT of submissions of amazing photography from across Canada. We recently received a group submission that we just couldn't wait to share with our national audience. Brought to us by an amazing pro-active photo educator, Anna Wilson of Richmond Hill High School in Ontario, we felt that this outstanding set of images deserved some special recognition. VICTORIA I am someone who wants to speak out against something that isn’t accepted in everyday society. If you look closely at my image, the lock screen of the phone displays an audio book playing, which is titled “Ethics”. This can be interpreted in many ways, depending on the viewer’s point of view. I want this artwork to inspire others to have their own voice and to not be afraid of sticking up for what they think is right. MARYIAM My image, “Fear of the World”, describes the fear a shy individual has to the outside world. A door pushed to shut out the dangers of the outside world, while balloons represent the spirit of childhood, imagination and creativity, reflecting how much really goes on in a quiet person’s active mind. ERICA I am made up of many different pieces of a complex puzzle. I am removing one piece of this puzzle, as there are some memories that I want to erase. Despite wanting to avoid these negative memories, if I remove the piece, I lose a part of myself. Similar to a puzzle, where when it is missing a piece it is not complete. DARIO The first figure (left standing) represents my desire to pursue a career in photography since it’s something I really enjoy doing and I consider myself decent at. I'm facing backwards because I don’t know what path to take to pursue my dream. The second figure (bottom right), represents my constant will to fly back to Italy because I miss my friends and family there. The third and fourth figures represent how I still feel out of place even though I’ve lived in Canada for more than a year. There’s something that doesn’t feel right even though everybody makes me feel welcome here and befriended me. SOPHIA The main theme of this work is self destruction. There are shadows inside us. Someone may have a nice surface but his or her inside is dark. No one can tell other people may be suffering. JANICE I am constantly overwhelmed by stress due to piles of homework and assignments thrown at me at school. Stress builds to the point where I feel like I am drowning with no escape. There is a crack in the glass which symbolizes my breaking point and my determination to overcome my stress. When I am able to break the glass, I can release all the water that is drowning me. As the water is released, my stress levels will decrease. AMANDA I have two sides, the bright side and dark side. One side stands straight with energy, with colors and brightness around me. The other side is when I am alone with gloomy darkness of negative moods, depression and anxiety. The hand, symbolizes the pressure and annoyances which I am suffering. These pressures are so big that the I am not able to escape when it is trying to catch me. The dark hand does not go to the positive side since no one can see I am suffering. #photomanipulation #emergingartists #studentphotographer

In case you missed our EDMONTON 2019 PHOTO INSPIRATION Pecha Kucha Event AT THE GARNEAU THEATRE - or you wanna see it again - check out Adam Borman's presentation on why he loves working in the studio, and how your only limitation in the studio is your imagination. In case you're not familiar - Pecha Kucha is a format where speakers only have 20 slides X 20 secs/ slide to share their story. It's TOUGH. But really, really fun... #emergingartists #fineartphotography #studentphotographer #studiophotography #AlbertaPhotographer

In case ya missed our TORONTO 2018 PHOTO INSPIRATION Pecha Kucha Event - or wanna see it again - photographer + artist Justin Atkins shares his work, and tells us about his creative experiments, creating alter egos, and entertaining yourself through photography. In case you're not familiar - Pecha Kucha is a format where speakers only have 20 slides X 20 secs/ slide to share their story. It's TOUGH. But really, really fun... PhotoED Magazine awarded Justin our first ever InFocus Photo Emerging Artist Award in Edmonton in 2018! We also featured his work in our Spring/ Summer 2018 issue: Manipulated Images. Get inspired. Get your copy before they are sold out HERE. #emergingartists #fineartphotography

In case you missed our EDMONTON 2019 PHOTO INSPIRATION Pecha Kucha Event AT THE GARNEAU THEATRE - check out portrait photographer Ryan Parker's presentation that will change the way you think about shooting portraits. In case you're not familiar - Pecha Kucha is a format where speakers only have 20 slides X 20 secs/ slide to share their story. It's TOUGH. But really, really worth it. #AlbertaPhotographer #fineartphotography #photohistoryincanada #portraitphotography #studiophotography