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Win a Solo Exhibition in May 2026 + An Exclusive Interview!
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Julien Coomans
Julien Coomans
Julien Coomans

Julien Coomans

Country: Belgium

Julien Coomans is a Brussels based amateur photographer with a passion for photographing the natural world.
He is a highly artistic individual which led him to pursue a career as an Architect. In his free time he loves to explore his artistic side through the medium of photography and has been commended for his images in several photographic publications.
​ Through experimenting with his camera settings and techniques, Julien seeks to capture scenes of tranquillity and minimalism in a bid to counter the hustle and bustle of his daily city life.
​ He travels widely in Europe, whether it be to the expansive northern beaches of Flanders or the rugged mountains of northern Italy, Julien is happiest when at one with nature. His camera is simply an excuse to get out there, discover beautiful places and capture stunning images.

Fishing Huts, Fouras, France
I traveled to Fouras on the west coast of France to photograph some unusual but picturesque fishing huts that are dotted along the coast line. Central to my vision was to take a series of long exposures in order to set a tranquil scene and emphasise the elegant wooden structures.

The first day was miserable - windy and a lot of rain - yet despite this I was amazed by the beauty of the huts. Undeterred, I used my time to study the scene and find my compositions, ready to pounce when conditions were just right. The hardest part about finding the right compositions was avoiding stretches of land on the horizon as the bay curves quite dramatically. I had to find the perfect balance between fishing hut, weather conditions and the horizon line beyond. After finding my compositions my next challenge was to watch out for the tide times. I had to shoot as the tide was going out not only to physically be able to take the shot but to be sure I was safe.

On the second day the conditions improved and I had my window between outgoing and incoming tides. The wind had died down making the water much calmer which was better as I could keep the exposure down to a few minutes to try and improve my chance of avoiding any tripod wobble. After shooting my pre-scouted compositions and checking the LCD screen for sharpness I packed up and went for a well earned beer!
 

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More Great Photographers To Discover

Tamara Dean
Australia
1976
Tamara Dean (b. 1976, Sydney, Australia) is a photographic artist whose works explore the informal rites of passage and rituals of young people within the natural world.Her solo shows include Ritualism, Divine Rites, This too Shall Pass and Only Human.Dean has received numerous awards including a $10,000 High Commendation prize in the 2013 Moran Contemporary Photographic Award, the 2011 Olive Cotton Award and 2009 Sydney Life: Art & About.Dean’s works have been widely exhibited both nationally and internationally. Her works have featured in ‘Dangerous Beauty’ curated by Stephan Stoyanov, Bulgaria 2013, the 2013 Aspettando FotoLeggendo festival in Rome, Fotofever Brussels Art Fair, 2012 and Pingyao Photography Festival, China, 2012 as well as at leading Australian galleries including Inheritance 2009 and Hijacked 2 – New Australian & German Photography 2010, both at the Australian Centre for Photography; Sydney Now – New Australian Photojournalism, Museum of Sydney 2007; Terra Australis Incognita at Monash Gallery of Art.Dean has been awarded artist residencies with ArtOmi, New York (2013), and previously Taronga Zoo, Montsalvat and repeatedly in the remote gold-mining town of Hill End, NSW.For a decade Dean was a member of Oculi photographic collective.Dean’s work is held in a number of public and private collections including Artbank, Sydney; The Francis J. Greenburger Collection, New York; the Mordant Family Collection, Australia; and is represented by Olsen Irwin Gallery Sydney and James Makin Gallery Melbourne.Source: www.tamaradean.com
Dirk Roseport
Belgium
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Advertising creative director and self-taught photographer. Inspired by Jem Southam, Jonathan Smith, Mark Rothko, Mies van der Rohe, Mihokajioka, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Annie Leibovitz, Asako Naharashi and new discoveries every day... Roseport focuses on projects that he fills out thematically over several years. CLOSER TO THE GODS Closer To The Gods was created during the Covid era when, like many photographers, he fell back on previously created material; inhospitable plateaus and glaciers of Iceland, the mountain landscapes of the Pyrenees and the high altitude deserts of Ladakh. In Closer To The Gods, these are portrayed hard and directly in powerful, high-contrast black-and-white photography. Nature does not invite here, she imposes. Compelling, ominous, at times almost menacing. It is a nature that impresses and often looks as if it could insidiously swallow and crush us at any moment. TRANSCENDENTAL TRANQUILITY In his project Transcendental Tranquility he brings us seascapes, distilled to their essence, authentic without any post-processing. It all has to happen in the camera. If it doesn't happen there, it goes into the trash. Sometimes the oceans are no longer recognizable and they become Rothkosian color impressions, but his goal is not to show an ocean. The point is to create a scene that induces a state of tranquility in which what is perceived as troublesome in the psyche falls away. Nature does not impose itself here, but invites the viewer to drown in it and regain the peace that we so often lack today. Roseport sees the Transcendental Tranquility project as the antithesis of the Closer To The Gods work. FADING MEMORIES Always exploring, Roseport also created the Fading Memories project that invites viewers to create their own stories. Roseport: "As time passes, memories fade. What was once sharp, clear and vivid in our minds becomes blurred. Shapes and colors disappear. Bits and pieces are gone never to return. With Fading Memories, I try to visualize this feeling of losing the details. The images take on a dreamlike surreal atmosphere. And usually we will remember what has been forgotten, more beautifully - if hard or soft - than it actually was. That's what we do. That's how we survive. In Fading Memories, I know the story behind the image. The place. The time. The people. The viewers don't. There is an analogy here with projective tests like Rorschach, when ambigious stimuli reveal hidden emotions and internal conflicts. Thanks to what the viewers don't see, the images suggest more open stories than the ones I know. More open stories than they would see if the images were intact. So their minds will create their own story. Immediately. I invite them not to stop it. Have Fading Memories challenge their imagination."
Gilles Nicolet
France
1960
I am a self-taught photographer who spent 35 years living and working in Africa, with long stays in Somalia, West Africa and Tanzania. I started out as an agricultural engineer but soon switched to photography in order to follow an old passion. I have since shot numerous stories for all sorts of magazines, including the Sunday Times Magazine, National Geographic Magazine, Geo, the Smithsonian and Paris-Match. I have a special interest in anthropology and ethnography, something that - I hope - has helped me capture the essence of my subjects. In the past most of my stories where about rare traditions that somehow linked man and wildlife, but Africa has changed a lot in the last few decades and unfortunately most of these traditions have now disappeared. My recent work has therefore been more personal and contemplative and less focused on narrative picture stories meant for magazines. In fact, today my interest lies in the convergence between art and documentary photography. I have also moved away from color photography and now only shoot in black and white. My work has received several major awards, including a World Press Photo Award and a Fuji Award. My latest project on the Swahili Coast also obtained the following recognitions: 2017 HIPA Hamdan International Photography Awards - 2nd Prize, Portfolio Category 2017 Elliott Erwitt Havana Fellowship - Nominee 2017 Seventh Annual Exposure Photography Awards - Winner 2017 IPA International Photography Awards - 2nd Prize, People/Culture Category 2017 Meitar Award - Nominee 2017 Monochrome Photography Awards - Photojournalism/Professional - Two Honorable Mentions 2017 Monochrome Photography Awards - People/Professional - Honorable Mention 2018 CAP Contemporary African Photography Prize - Finalist 2018 SIPA Contest - Honorable Mention 2019 SOPHOT Award - Winner This work on the Swahili Coast is featured in "Swahili", a book released by Contrejour Publishers in May 2019 (available on amazon.fr and amazon.co.uk). Six degrees south The Zanzibar archipelago, an highly evocative name even for those who are quite unable to locate it on a map, lies six degrees south of the Equator. It is also the exact geographical center of the Swahili Coast, a unique physical, historical and cultural entity running from Southern Somalia to Mozambique, which first grew in the 10th century through trade with the Arab world, India and China. Gold, coconut, ebony, mangrove wood, sisal, myrrh and the infamous slave trade helped make the wealth of this region, slowly shaping it and giving it its unique present character. For a thousand years now, wooden dhows have sailed these lonely shores, with their characteristic white cotton sails, using the monsoon winds to help traders move goods between Africa and Arabia. And for a thousand years too, fishermen have ploughed these rich seas for their bounty of fish, contributing with the traders to the emergence of rich city-ports like Stone Town or Mombasa. But all of this is changing now. A combination of overfishing by both local and foreign ships, population increase, changes in weather patterns as well as the recent discovery of huge gas fields in the region, is threatening this fragile equilibrium. The fishing communities that occupy these shores are particularly at risk, and it could be that we are now witnessing the last of fishing and sailing traditions that had remained largely unchanged since Ibn Battuta, the famous 12th Century Arab explorer, first described them in his travel memoirs. With this recent work I have tried to testify to the unique beauty and timelessness of the Swahili Coast, and to record it for generations to come. It is a personal, melancholic, sometimes dreamy vision of a place and a culture that are very dear to my heart but which, I now realise, may soon disappear.
Bharat Patel
United Kingdom
1949
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