All about photo.com: photo contests, photography exhibitions, galleries, photographers, books, schools and venues.
FINAL CALL TO ENTER AAP MAGAZINE SHAPES: PUBLICATION AND $1,000 CASH PRIZES
FINAL CALL TO ENTER AAP MAGAZINE SHAPES: PUBLICATION AND $1,000 CASH PRIZES
  1. Home
  2. All Photographers
  3. Rising Photographers
  4. Valerie Laney
Valerie Laney
Valerie Laney
Valerie Laney

Valerie Laney

Country: United States
Birth: 1964

Valerie Elizabeth Laney was born in sunny San Diego, California, and was raised in rural North Carolina, where she spent endless summers catching tadpoles and chasing fireflies and exploring the surrounding woods, creeks and tobacco fields. Growing up in and around nature inspired her to spread her wings, and she has spent years exploring and photographing our wondrous planet. Valerie holds a degree in Visual Design from North Carolina State University, College of Design which, when combined with a career as a Graphic Designer, enhances her skill in composition as well as visual story telling. Photography was a natural outcome of her love of nature and her skill as an artist; and it has become her passion to capture images of unique places, diverse landscapes and fascinating cultures.

A love of adventure sends her on photo expeditions to places like Iceland, Madagascar and the steppes of Mongolia, where her photographs capture majestic landscapes, native cultures, wildlife and underwater marine life. Valerie loves sharing her photography and hopes it inspires dreams, travel and memories for her growing audience.

Statement

Photography allows one to capture the world in a way that is unique to the beholder. Photos are visual story telling, but yet, everyone is left to their own interpretation of the story that is being told. So in that way, photography allows both the photographer and the onlooker to take part in the creative process. I compose photos to give a sense of what is happening in the shot: viewers should feel the cold, smell the air, and feel like they can anticipate the moments that followed as if they were present.

Website

www.valerielaneyphotography.com

 

Inspiring Portfolios

Aleksander Rodchenko
© Aleksander Rodchenko
Fabien Dendiével
© Fabien Dendiével
Umberto Verdoliva
© Umberto Verdoliva
Call for Entries
AAP Magazine #59 Shapes
Publish your work in our printed magazine and win $1,000 cash prizes
© Barbara Hazen
 
Stay up-to-date  with call for entries, deadlines and other news about exhibitions, galleries, publications, & special events.

More Great Photographers To Discover

Sebastian Piatek
Sebastian Piatek
Germany
1982
Sebastian Piatek was born in Poland and spent most of his life in Germany. He began exploring photography many years ago, when the first mobile phones with cameras became available. Back then, he mostly photographed family and friends. Over time, as he started to travel - especially to India - his interest deepened, and his style began to evolve. India became an incredible source of inspiration for Sebastian. In the beginning, he was drawn to capturing the chaos, colors, craziness - trying to fit as many people and as much life as possible into a single frame. But with time, and through recent travels beyond India, he started to change his perspective. A recent trip to Ethiopia had a profound impact on him and shifted his perspective very much. The few places he visited there deeply influenced how he wants to approach his work in the future, in a more simplistic way. He knows he will return to Ethiopia, and he is eager to explore other parts of Africa as well - to capture its beauty in a much more minimal and also cleaner way. Awarded Photographer of the Week - Week 13, 2026
Colin Jones
Colin Jones
United Kingdom
1936
Colin Jones is an English ballet dancer-turned-photographer and prolific photojournalist of post-war Britain. Jones documented facets of social history as diverse as the vanishing industrial working lives of the North East coalfields, Grafters, delinquent Afro-Caribbean youth in London, The Black House, hedonistic 1960s Swinging London with pictures of The Who early in their career, the 1963 race riots in Alabama, Soviet Leningrad, and remnants of a rural Britain now lost to history. Jones was born in 1936. He experienced a war childhood; his father, a Poplar, East End printer, went away as a soldier on the Burma campaign. Jones' family was evacuated to Essex and he attended a succession of thirteen schools whilst struggling with dyslexia, before the age of sixteen, when he took up ballet lessons. In 1960 Jones was called up for national service and served in the Queen's Royal Regiment. Fresh out of the army, Colin joined the Royal Opera House, later moving to the Touring Royal Ballet and embarked on a nine-month world tour. Jones met, and for four years was married to, the great ballerina Lynn Seymour. Whilst on tour and running an errand for Dame Margot Fonteyn, he purchased his first camera, a Leica 3C rangefinder, in 1958 and started taking photographs of the dancers and backstage life during the Australian leg of the circuit. Jones admired the available-light backstage photography of Michael Peto, a Hungarian émigré, who agreed to mentor him. Colin Jones took advantage of the ballet company's travel to photograph extensively in the streets of Tokyo, Hong Kong and the Gorbals, Glasgow in 1961. Driving with fellow dancers from Newcastle to Sunderland that year, he saw, north of Birmingham, coal searchers on the spoil-heaps. In 1962, having changed his career to become a photographer for The Observer he returned to produce a series of photographs recording the vanishing industrial working poor and mining communities in the North East of England, later publishing the essay as the book Grafters. At The Observer he worked alongside photographers Philip Jones Griffiths and Don McCullin. He worked in Fleet Street for several years before turning freelance. Commissioned assignments took him to New York City in 1962; Liverpool docks in 1963; the race riots in Birmingham, Alabama, USA, where he made portraits of both 'Bull' Connor, and Dr Martin Luther King in 1963; Leningrad, USSR in 1964. In 1966 he photographed the British rock band The Who at the beginning of their career, and Pete Townshend, then Mick Jagger in 1967. He travelled to the Philippines in 1969 where he photographed the sex trade. He portrayed significant dancers, including Rudolph Nureyev for several publications. Jones’ work has been published in major publications including Life, National Geographic, Geo and Nova as well as many supplements for major broadsheet newspapers, most prominently The Times, who dubbed Jones "The George Orwell of British photography". In his later career he covered assignments around the world, including Jamaica in 1978; the indigenes of the New Hebrides and Zaire in 1980; Tom Waits in New York, 1981; San Blas Islands in 1982; Ireland in 1984; Xian, China in 1985; Ladakh in northern India 1994 and Bunker Hill, Kansas in 1996. Solo exhibitions have been devoted to his work: The Black House: Colin Jones at The Photographers' Gallery in London, 4 May – 4 June 1977 as well as at many other galleries. Martin Harrison’s Young Meteors associated Jones with other important British photographers including Don McCullin and Terence Donovan. In 2013 the Victoria and Albert Museum acquired three of Jones' historic photographs from The Black House series, along with a photograph by Dennis Morris depicting the original Black House associated with Michael X, both acquired as part of Staying Power, a five year partnership between the V&A and Black Cultural Archives, preserving black British experience from the 1950s to the 1990s through photographs and oral histories. The Arts Council also purchased his work.Source: Wikipedia The art of photography remains so fascinating because of the individuals who arrive from unexpected places and take the medium through a lifetime of changes. The career of Colin Jones has a startling trajectory. He was born in 1936, in time to be a war child, a father away as a soldier, and 13 different schools. An element of chance, as well as talent, led to a scholarship at the Royal Ballet School. The moment that defined Jones's later life occurred as he was driving with fellow-dancers from Newcastle to Sunderland one day in 1961. Travelling north of Birmingham and seeing the winding gear of coalmines had always excited Jones, who was steeped in the books of George Orwell, but now he saw the extraordinary drama of spoil-heaps swarming with coal searchers - an epic of reality and survival. Colin Jones is one of the most celebrated and prolific photographers of post-war Britain. He has documented facets of social history over the years as diverse as the vanishing industrial working lives of the Northeast (Grafters), delinquent Afro-Caribbean youth in London (The Black House), and most recently, the high-octane hedonism of Swinging London with his famous pictures of The Who early in their career. His work has been published in every major publication with any regard for the image and photography. Such as Life, and National Geographic, as well as many supplements for the major broadsheets. He has had solo exhibitions at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC and at the Photographers Gallery in London, as well as at many other venues internationally.Source: Michael Hoppen Gallery
James Hayman
James Hayman
United States
After attending The American University for photojournalism, Hayman's first photography assignment was to photograph Nixon and Brezhnev at the 1973 Washington Summit in the White House Rose Garden. Disenchanted with the paparazzi-like frenzy, Hayman went on to study film at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and post-graduate work at New York University, though his photojournalistic roots still inform his practice today. Both his photojournalism and film education led him to travel around the world. He notably traveled to Central America, working for the UN's disaster relief efforts after the 1976 earthquake in Guatemala. This led to several series of photographic work in the region. In the 1980s, Hayman began shooting various independent films in New York City, gaining recognition as the cinematographer for An Autumn's Tale, starring Chow Yun-Fat, which swept the Hong Kong Film Awards in 1987. This led to several years of Hayman working as a cinematographer in China, Japan, and more series of photographic work documenting Asia in the 1980s. As indie film production in New York City began to end in 1989, he moved to Los Angeles, where he went on to direct and produce multiple television shows and films. Since then, he has directed numerous pilots, including Dangerous Minds and Drop Dead Diva, as well as episodes of The Sopranos, ER, Law & Order, House, Desperate Housewives, and others. Hayman has also worked as an executive producer, most notably on Ugly Betty, which led to winning a Golden Globe Award. He has also been nominated for two Emmy Awards, and a Director's Guild Award. Read the Exclusive Interview
André Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri
André Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri
France
1819 | † 1889
André-Adolphe-Eugène Disdéri (French: 28 March 1819 - 4 October 1889) was a French photographer who started his photographic career as a daguerreotypist but gained greater fame for patenting his version of the carte de visite, a small photographic image which was mounted on a card. Disdéri, a brilliant showman, made this system of mass-production portraiture world famous. Disdéri began his working life in a number of occupations, while also studying art. He started as a daguerreotypist in Brest in 1848 or 1849 but in December 1852 or January 1853 he moved to Nîmes. There he received assistance from Édouard Boyer and Joseph Jean Pierre Laurent with his photography-related chemistry experiments. After a year in Nîmes he moved to Paris, enabling easy access to people who would be the subjects of his cartes de visite. Photographs had previously served as calling cards,[6] but Disdéri's invention of the paper carte de visite (i.e. "visiting card") photograph second enabled the mass production of photographs. On 27 November 1854 he patented the system of printing ten photographs on a single sheet (although there is no evidence that a system printing more than eight actually materialized). This was the first patent ever for a carte de visite. Disdéri's's cartes de visite were 6X9 cm, about the size of conventional (nonphotographic) visiting cards of the time, and were made by a camera with four lenses and a sliding plate holder; a design inspired by the stereoscopic cameras. The novelty quickly spread throughout the world. According to a German visitor, Disdéri's studio became "really the Temple of Photography - a place unique in its luxury and elegance. Daily he sells three to four thousand francs worth of portraits". The fact that these photos could be reproduced inexpensively and in great quantity brought about the decline of the daguerreotype and ushered in a carte de visite craze as they became enormously popular throughout Europe and the United States. So great was the publicity that all of Paris wanted portraits. Disdéri also invented the twin-lens reflex camera. The great French photographer Nadar, who was Disdéri's competitor, wrote about the new invention in his autobiographical "Quand j'étais photographe", "about the appearance of Disdéri and Carte de Visite... It spelled disaster. Either you had to succumb - that is to say, follow the trend - or resign." At the pinnacle of his career, Disdéri was extremely wealthy and renowned; but like another famous photographer, Mathew Brady, he is reported to have died in near poverty. By the end of his life, Disdéri had become penniless. He died on 4 October 1889 in the Hôpital Ste. Anne in Paris, "an institution for indigents, alcoholics, and the mentally ill". He was a victim of his own invention. The system which he invented and popularized was so easy to imitate that photographers all over the world took advantage of it.
Eugene Resh
Eugene Resh
United States
1974
Eugene Resh is a Belarus-born American photographer who spent most of his life in San Francisco and is currently based in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. He has been taking photographs for as long as he can remember – including the childhood days of shooting with an old Zenit film camera and developing and printing films in a converted bathroom. Those days are long gone, but Eugene rarely leaves house without his digital camera.  His favourite genres are street and travel, although he likes to blend the two. On his trips across the world, he seeks out to reflect and portray each destination, each country through the eyes of a street wanderer, a quiet observer. According to Eugene, the best way to capture the essence of any place is through the faces and captured emotions of its inhabitants. True to that statement, most of his work includes people of various walks of life that he encounters on his journeys.  All About Photo Competitions Photographer of the Week 26, 2026
Bryan Adams
Bryan Adams
Canada
1959
Adams works as a photographer as well as musician, aside from being published in British Vogue, L'uomo Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, Esquire, Interview magazine and i-D, among others, he has also shot advertising campaigns for Guess Jeans, Sand, Converse, Montblanc, John Richmond, Fred Perry, and more recently for Escada. He has won Lead Awards twice in Germany for his fashion work, most recently June 2012 and previously in 2006. Other photographic endeavours include founding the art fashion Zoo Magazine, based in Berlin, Germany for which he shoots for regularly. His first book of photos will be released by Steidl in 2012 entitled Exposed. Previous published collaborations include; American Women June 2005, for Calvin Klein in the United States; proceeds from this book went to Memorial Sloan–Kettering Cancer Center in New York City for their breast cancer research for programs, and Made in Canada December 1999 for Flare Magazine in Canada; proceeds went to the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation. Both books were dedicated to his friend Donna, who died of the disease. As a photographer, Adams has worked with many of his musical peers, including Lana Del Rey, The Who, Sting, Shania Twain, Mick Jagger, Arcade Fire, Ray Charles, Tina Turner, Rod Stewart, Robert Plant, Take That, Joss Stone, Plácido Domingo, Sarah McLachlan, Celine Dion, Billy Idol, Moby, Lindsay Lohan, Amy Winehouse, Annie Lennox, Peter Gabriel, Bryan Ferry, Lenny Kravitz, Die Antwoord, and Morrissey to name a few. On 27 November 2000 Adams played onstage with The Who at the Royal Albert Hall. A DVD of the concert was issued. Adams photographed the band and his photos appear in the DVD booklet. In 2002, Adams was invited, along with other photographers from the Commonwealth, to photograph Queen Elizabeth II during her Golden Jubilee; one of the photographs from this session was used as a Canadian postage stamp in 2004 and again in 2005 (see Queen Elizabeth II definitive stamp (Canada)), another portrait of both Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip is now in the National Portrait Gallery in London. Adams supports the Hear the World initiative as a photographer in its aim to raise global awareness for the topic of hearing and hearing loss. He photographed Michael J. Fox and Tatjana Patitz in the 2011 Carl Zeiss AG company calendar in New York City in the summer of 2010. The focus was about the size difference of the subjects in a comedic presentation. In 2011, Adams provided the cover art for Lioness: Hidden Treasures, a posthumous release by Amy Winehouse.Source: Wikipedia Rock Icon Bryan Adams' lifelong interest in photography turned into a vocation when he began shooting for fashion magazines and advertisers more than a decade ago. But it's not all models and celebrities: He most recently turned his lens on 40 British soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. His series Wounded: The Legacy of War, the subject of a 2013 book from Steidl and an exhibit at London’s Somerset House on display this month through Jan. 25, showcases the brutal (and all too common) injuries incurred in battle. "I didn't like the fact that people were getting so badly hurt, so many people were killed, were displaced, forgotten. This is my statement," says Adams, 55. On the legacy of the images, he says, "I hope [people] realize that these guys made an incredible sacrifice. War is disgusting and this is the result of what happens when we decide to beat each other up."Source: Billboard
Trine Søndergaard
Trine Søndergaard
Denmark
1972
Trine Søndergaard (b. 1972) is a Danish photography-based visual artist. Søndergaard lives and works in Copenhagen, Denmark. Trine Søndergaard's work is marked by a precision and a sensibility that co-exist with an investigation of the medium of photography, its boundaries and what constitutes an image. Layered with meaning and quiet emotion, her works are highly acclaimed for their visual intensification of our perception of reality. In 2000 she was awarded The Albert Renger-Patzsch Prize and has since received numerous grants and fellowships, including a three-year working grant from the Danish Arts Foundation. Trine Søndergaard's work has been featured in solo and group exhibitions around the world, and is represented in major public museum collections. Trine Søndergaard is represented by Martin Asbæk Gallery in Copenhagen.
Rupert Chambers
Rupert Chambers
United States
1944
Rupert Chambers enjoyed only episodic involvement in his passion for photography until he retired. In retirement, he is the fine arts photographer he always wanted to be. He initially focused on candid street photography, especially in Mexico and Guatemala, until Covid masked his subjects, chased them indoors, and limited his travel. That reoriented him toward the rich landscape and “new topographic” opportunities close to his Taos home in northern New Mexico, at least until the shortage of oxygen at high altitudes transported him to the California coast. He now creates intimate, intertidal landscapes within the threshold between sea and land — the liminal in the littoral. On the Pacific coast, twice each day it is sea, and twice each day it is land. It belongs to both; it belongs to neither. His work owes an obvious intellectual debt to California Impressionism and to the West Coast Photographic Movement. Now in his eighties, he has been drawn increasingly to the patience of intertidal rocks as subjects. He shares Edward Weston’s objective “to photograph a rock, have it look like a rock, but be MORE than a rock.” The past year he has increasingly employed long exposures on a tripod to emphasize the fluidity of the sea in contrast to the sculptural geology of seastacks, especially backlit at negative low tides. All About Photo Competitions AAP Magazine 56 Shadows
Aindreas Scholz
Aindreas Scholz
Ireland/Germany
1981
I’m Aindreas Scholz, a photographer and educator based in London, UK, working with analogue and cameraless photographic processes. Growing up between Ireland and Germany in a bilingual family shaped how I think about place, belonging, and the environments we move through. My practice is slow and material-led, often collaborating with sunlight, polluted seawater, acidic rain, and vulnerable plant specimens to make images that hold traces of ecological change and deep time. Artist Statement: I make images with and within vulnerable landscapes, letting natural elements co-author the final print. I’m interested in care, responsibility, and the uneven ways climate change is lived. I want the work to feel intimate, like evidence that asks for attention rather than spectacle. AAP Magazine AAP Magazine 54 Nature
Advertisement
AAP Magazine #59 Shapes
Win a Solo Exhibition in Aug
AAP Magazine #59 Shapes

Latest Interviews

Exclusive Interview with Susan Anthony
Interview
Exclusive Interview with Susan Anthony
American photographer Susan Anthony brings a painter’s eye to documentary photography, creating nuanced portraits of people and places shaped by time, community, and tradition. Her work is rooted in observation, empathy, and a deep curiosity about the lives of others. Through long-term projects, she explores the relationship between individuals and the environments they inhabit, revealing the stories that connect people to a place and to one another.
Read the full interview
Exclusive Interview with Carole Mills Noronha
Interview
Exclusive Interview with Carole Mills Noronha
Carole Mills Noronha is an Australian photographer whose deeply personal work explores memory, family, loss, and the fragile nature of identity. Living with epilepsy and a lifelong sensitivity to light, she has developed a distinctive photographic language rooted in observation, empathy, and emotional connection. Her images are shaped by lived experience, revealing intimate stories with remarkable honesty and tenderness.
Read the full interview
Exclusive Interview with Trevor Cole: Pastoral Peoples and Practices
Interview
Exclusive Interview with Trevor Cole: Pastoral Peoples and Practices
For this interview, we wanted to focus specifically on The Face of the Mundari and the wider Pastoral Peoples and Practices series. We spoke with Trevor about his long-term work among the Mundari, what continues to draw him back to their cattle camps, and the experience of documenting a culture whose identity remains deeply connected to livestock, tradition, and the natural environment.
Read the full interview
Exclusive Interview with Frank Meo
Interview
Exclusive Interview with Frank Meo
In our latest exclusive feature for All About Photo, I speak with veteran photography representative Frank Meo about what it truly takes to build a sustainable creative career today. Frank brings decades of experience working with Fortune 500 companies, major agencies, and documentary photographers to the table. We dive into the critical business skills often left out of art school curriculums, the power of mentorship, and the inspiring evolution of PROJECTIONS—his international salon platform for visual storytellers. It’s an essential read for anyone navigating the commercial or editorial photography landscape today.
Read the full interview
Exclusive Interview with Carolyn Moore
Interview
Exclusive Interview with Carolyn Moore
American photographer Carolyn Moore explores the inner landscape of emotion, memory, and personal transformation through a deeply intuitive photographic practice. Her work unfolds as a quiet dialogue between artist and viewer, where images become a space for reflection, vulnerability, and connection.
Read the full interview
Exclusive Interview with Luca Desienna and Laura Estelle Barmwoldt
Interview
Publication
Exclusive Interview with Luca Desienna and Laura Estelle Barmwoldt
For over seven years, Of Lilies and Remains has explored the depths of the goth and darkwave underground, unfolding in Leipzig—a city long associated with a vibrant and enduring subcultural scene. Moving between iconic gatherings such as Wave-Gotik-Treffen and more intimate moments on the fringes, the project offers a rare and immersive glimpse into a world often misunderstood, yet rich in expression and community. Created by Luca in collaboration with Laura Estelle Barmwoldt, the work embraces a cinematic and deeply personal approach. Rather than documenting from a distance, it moves within the scene itself, capturing its atmosphere, its codes, and its quiet contradictions. The title Of Lilies and Remains hints at this duality—where beauty and darkness, fragility and strength coexist. As the book prepares for its release, we spoke with both artists about the origins of the project, their process, and what it means to document a subculture that continues to evolve while remaining true to its spirit.
Read the full interview
Exclusive Interview with Matthew Finley
Interview
Exclusive Interview with Matthew Finley
American photographer Matthew Finley turns inward, using photography as a way to explore identity, memory, and emotional truth. Based in Los Angeles, his practice moves between performance, gesture, and found imagery, creating a visual language that is both intimate and deeply personal
Read the full interview
Exclusive Interview with Jan Janssen
Interview
Exclusive Interview with Jan Janssen
Dutch photographer Jan Janssen explores universal human experiences through his long-term project It Matters, winner of the May 2025 Solo Exhibition. Begun in 2016, the series captures intimate moments of everyday life—love, loss, connection, and belonging—across Central and Eastern Europe. Working in countries such as Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia, Janssen spends extended time within communities, building relationships based on trust and respect. His approach allows him to move beyond observation, revealing deeply human and authentic moments. Rooted in travel and personal discovery, It Matters reflects Janssen’s search for what connects us all in an increasingly divided world. The project is ongoing and will culminate in a photobook scheduled for publication in 2026.
Read the full interview
Exclusive Interview with Henk Kosche
Interview
Exclusive Interview with Henk Kosche
German photographer Henk Kosche turns his lens toward the streets of Halle an der Saale, capturing everyday life in the late years of the former German Democratic Republic. At the time, Kosche was studying design and exploring the city with his camera, drawn to the atmosphere of its industrial landscape and the quiet rhythms of daily life. His series Street Photography at the End of the 80s, selected as the Solo Exhibition for July 2025, revisits a body of work created just before a period of profound change. Rediscovered decades later in a small box of 35mm negatives, these photographs offer glimpses of a city and its people at a moment suspended between the familiar and the unknown.
Read the full interview
Call for Entries
AAP Magazine #59 Shapes
Publish your work in our printed magazine and win $1,000 cash prizes
© Roland Blum
Explore All About Photo
All About Photo
About Us
Contact Us
Link Back
Press
Blog
Newsletter
Terms of Use
Privacy Policy
Competitions
All About Photo Competitions
Our Jurors
All Photo Contests
Open Photo Contests
Amateur Photo Contests
Professional Photo Contests
Portfolio Reviews
Photo Competition News
Artists
Photographers A-Z
Masters of Photography
Modern Photographers
Rising Photographers
Articles
Interviews
Inspirational
Photography Exhibitions
Photography Festivals
Photo Fairs
Photo Museums
Galleries & Centers
Photographer Monographs
Technique Books
History of Photography
Miscellaneous
Paper Magazines
Online Magazines
Resources
Schools and Classes
Photography Agencies
Equipment Rentals
Studio Rentals
Photo Labs
Camera Repairs
Framing Stores
Photo Tips & Tools
Photo Gear
© 2026 © All-About-Photo.com, All Rights Reserved  •  Photographs © the Respective Artists, All Rights Reserved.