WHO? My name is Karen Zusman, but I happily answer to KZ. I came to photography about 10 years ago when I was recording an audio story about a group of Burmese refugees who were being sold to human traffickers by Malaysian state officials. I was in the region as a Buddhist meditator and when I learned what was happening, I based myself in Kuala Lumpur in order to make this story.
Interviews
Interview with Stefano Mirabella
WHO? My name is Stefano Mirabella, born 1973 in Rome, the city where I still live and photograph. For many years, I worked in the television sector for a few satellite thematic channels. But always, photography has been my greatest passion, since the day of my first communion when my uncle gave me a Yashica mf2 that I still keep with great care. In photography, I was trained in the best schools in Rome and then I followed a very personal journey, to the continuous discovery of authors and genres, I studied a lot and started to collect numerous photographic books.
Interview with Ian Johnson
WHO? I am a color photographer based in NYC (for now). In my professional life I am a freelance video editor. Apart from photography I have a great interest in music (I am a conservatory-trained jazz musician), visual art and the cinema, the latter of which has played a great role in my understanding of still photography, both aesthetically and technically.
Interview with Damian Milczarek
WHO? I was born, and I still live in the city of Sochaczew near the capital of Poland. In Warsaw, where I work and photograph, I spend pretty much almost every moment of my life.
Interview with Ranita Roy
WHO? I’m a person who didn’t always want to be a photographer. Although I do have an early memory of being given a camera by my mother to photograph a school outing, I can’t really remember using a camera for anything else until I was almost thirty years old. At that time a friend showed me the work of some well known photographers, and also introduced me to camera fundamentals and the darkroom.
Interview with Ed Peters
WHO? I’m a person who didn’t always want to be a photographer. Although I do have an early memory of being given a camera by my mother to photograph a school outing, I can’t really remember using a camera for anything else until I was almost thirty years old. At that time a friend showed me the work of some well known photographers, and also introduced me to camera fundamentals and the darkroom.
Interview with Valérie Six
WHO? I was born in the North of France but spent my teens in the Paris region and currently live in the Bordeaux surroundings.
Although our family tree shows an evident taste and aptitude for the arts across the generations, they were never encouraged or considered as a ‘real’ profession. Surprisingly, it was only recently that I learned that my great-grandfather, whose track we had lost, was both a talented photographer (transforming his pictures into paintings-like images) and the first flutist of the Paris Opera.
Interview with Dan Ziskie
WHO? I grew up in Detroit where I had an uncle who was a musician and who also ran a camera store. One day he gave me a Brownie camera which I still have, and he would come to our house and he and my father would film hours of family events, when small film cameras were becoming available to everyone. I suppose that was the first seed of my interest in photography.
Interview with Sachin Chauhan
WHO? I was born in Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh, India, in the year 1997. When I was just six months old my family moved to Gurgaon, Haryana, where I’ve been living since. It has only been about four years since I’ve been into photography. Coming from a lower middle class family, photography as a career was unthinkable, let alone purchasing a camera. I think that’s the reason I really understood the value of photography, and emotionally connected with it. I purchased my first camera when I was in the first year of college, studying journalism and mass communication, it was a point and shoot.
Interview with Ken Walton
WHO? I hate this part. I’m a 5th-generation Californian, a resident of San Francisco, and the father of an 11 year-old daughter. I’m one of those people who is lousy at most things and fairly good at a few. I was really good at driving a taxi, which paid poorly, and really lousy at practicing law, which paid fairly well. I ended up starting software companies, which fell into the sweet spot. My last venture was a video game start-up that grew quickly and attracted the attention of a global conglomerate called Electronic Arts, which bought it. Alas, I was lousy at working for a global conglomerate, and soon found myself unemployed, depressed, and sitting on my couch.