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Win a Solo Exhibition this February. Juror: Harvey Stein
Win a Solo Exhibition this February. Juror: Harvey Stein
Cathleen Naundorf
Cathleen Naundorf
Cathleen Naundorf

Cathleen Naundorf

Country: France/Germany

Cathleen Naundorf is a French German photographer. In the late 1980s, she graduated from photography studies in Munich. She worked as a photo assistant in New York, Singapore and Paris in the following years, before she started traveling in 1993 to such destinations as Mongolia, Siberia, Gobi Desert and the Amazonas headwaters in Brazil. The results of these insightful pictures have been included in eight publications of renowned publishing houses. Inspired by her encounter of and longstanding friendship with Horst P. Horst, Cathleen Naundorf early on turned to fashion photography. As of 1997, she started photographing backstage Paris fashion shows for Condé Nast. Since 2005, Cathleen Naundorf has worked on her haute couture series “Un rêve de mode” focusing on seven couture houses : Chanel, Dior, Gaultier, Lacroix, Saab, Valentino and Philip Treacy. Thanks to her outstanding pictures, Cathleen Naundorf got the privilege to choose gowns from the couturiers’ archives for her elaborate and cinematic productions. This work got published in "The Polaroids of Cathleen Naundorf", Prestel Edition, 2012.

She works with large format cameras like Plaubel or Deardorff for her shootIngs and use mostly Polaroid or negative films. Cathleen Naundorf is working passionately on Haute Couture and Luxury Prêt-à-Porter. Her work got published in magazines like Harper's Bazaar, Tatler, VS Magazine or American Express.

Cathleen Naundorf's work is represented by the Hamiltons Gallery in London.
 

Cathleen Naundorf's Video

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All About Photo Awards 2026
$5,000 Cash Prizes! Juror: Steve McCurry
 
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More Great Photographers To Discover

Alessandro Puccinelli
My earliest professional experience dates from 1993 when I moved to Australia, as an assistant in advertising photography. Returning to Italy a few years later, I chose to concentrate my attention on commercial photography and personal work. At the age of 16 I had the great good fortune, especially living in Italy, a country not widely known for big waves, of discovering the joy of surfing. From that moment forward was born a strong link with the sea that still today profoundly influences my life choices, both professionally and personally. The presence of the sea in my daily life represents something extremely important to me onto which I project fear, dreams, hope and receiving in return inner strength and mental clarity. The choice of placing the sea centre stage in my life positively affects my personal work which, in truth, is born from this choice. In short, it is the place above all other places where I prefer to be. In an entirely natural way, in my personal work there has evolved a current of romanticism, reflected above all others in my love of the work of J.W Turner. This does not surprise me as with the sea I co habit with the virtues of force, elegance and simplicity. I recognise the sea in front of me as my ancestral home, it’s force and vastness make me feel small and vulnerable, yet, at the same time, it indicates to me a pathway, an example to follow or even a point of arrival. In 2008, motivated by the desire to remain in close contact with the ocean, I decided to divide my time between Italy and Portugal. Attracted by this country, bathed by a stupendous and vigorous sea, I found a good balance between a European lifestyle and a strong contact with nature. Today, I principally divide my time between Tuscany, Lisbon and the southern coast of Portugal where frequently I take refuge in my motorhome hideaway in search of intimacy with the ocean. My works have been recognized in many photography awards including, Sony World Photography Awards, International Photography Awards, Black and White Photography Awards, Hasselblad Masters and others.
Samantha VanDeman
United States
1982
Samantha was born in Chicago, IL. She received a BFA in Fine Art from Columbia College Chicago and an MFA in Visual Arts from The Art Institute of Boston at Lesley University. During the summer of 2003, Samantha studied drawing at Santa Repararta International School of Art in Florence, Italy. Her work has been published and exhibited in the United States and abroad. Samantha lives and works in Chicago, IL. Born in 1982, Samantha VanDeman grew up in the suburbs of Chicago. She studied fine arts at Columbia College Chicago, receiving a BFA in 2005. During her last year in college, she took a B+W photography class and found her passion. From that point on, she started to actively documenting everything around her. In 2007, she returned to college, this time to earn a MFA in photography from the Art Institute of Boston at Lesley University in 2009. It was during her time at the low residency program at AIB, that she was able to have independent studies with artists such as Anne Wilson, Mayumi Lake, Jeanne Dunning, and Laura Letinsky. Samantha has exhibited her work nationally. Her work has been exhibited at Emory Visual Arts Gallery, Atlanta, GA; Finch and Ada, NY; New Orleans Photo Alliance Gallery, New Orleans, LA; Las Manos Gallery, Chicago, IL; Gallery 263, Cambridge, MA; Midwest center for Photography, Wichita, KS; Gallery 808, Boston, MA; Change Artist Space, San Francisco, CA; Perspective Gallery, Evanston, IL; Barrett Art Center Galleries, Poughkeepsie, NY; Fourth Wall Projects in Boston, MA; The Center for Fine Art Photography in Fort Collins, CO; Newspace Center for Photography in Portland, OR; Black Box Gallery, Portland, OR; Texas Photographic Society, San Antonio, TX ; Wright Museum of Art in Beloit, WI and Review Santa Fe 100. Samantha VanDeman is adjunct faculty at The Art Institute of Illinois in Tinley Park, IL. All about Samantha VanDeman:AAP: When did you realize you wanted to be a photographer?My last year as an undergraduate at Columbia College Chicago, I took a Black and white photography class. It was then I knew I wanted to be a photographer. Up until that point, I wanted to be a painter. AAP: Where did you study photography? I studied photography at The Art Institute of Boston at Lesley University. During my time at The Art Institute of Boston, I had independent studies with Laura Letinsky, Jeanne Dunning, Anne Wilson and Mayumi Lake.AAP:Do you have a mentor?Laura Letinksy has been a friend/mentor since 2008 AAP: How long have you been a photographer?10 yearsAAP: Do you remember your first shot? What was it?My first shot was of rotten fruit.AAP: What or who inspires you?I’m inspired by silence, decay, kindness and long road trips. Artists who inspire me are Jenny Saville, Edward Hopper, Sally Mann and Fiona Apple.AAP: What kind of gear do you use? Camera, lens, digital, film?Canon 5DAAP: Do you spend a lot of time editing your images?I do minimal editing.AAP: Favorite(s) photographer(s)?Sally Mann, Angela Strassheim, Nan Goldin and Corrine DayAAP: What advice would you give a young photographer?Find your own voice and follow your gut. Your best work will come from the projects you are most passionate about.AAP: What mistake should a young photographer avoid?Trying too hard to be different or copying another photographer’s styleAAP: An idea, a sentence, a project you would like to share?I’m currently working on a project called “Died Alone”. This project explores abandoned living spaces of people that died alone in their home.AAP: Your best memory has a photographer?My fondest memory: The first time I explored the abandoned – now demolished Michael Reese Hospital in Chicago. I had never explored an abandoned place before Michael Reese Hospital, so it opened up a whole new world for me.AAP: If you could have taken the photographs of someone else who would it be?Weegee or Walker Evans
Sam Haskins
United Kingdom
1926 | † 2009
Sam Haskins, was a British photographer, born and raised in South Africa. He started his career in Johannesburg and moved to London in 1968. Haskins is best known for his contribution to in-camera image montage, Haskins Posters (1973) and the 1960's figure photography trilogy Five Girls (1962), Cowboy Kate & Other Stories (1964) and November Girl (1967), plus an ode to sub-Saharan tribal Africa African Image (1967). Cowboy Kate & Other Stories was probably the first book to deliberately explore black-and-white photographic grain as a medium for expression and image design. It was highly influential at the time, sold roughly a million copies worldwide and won the Prix Nadar in France in 1964. It continues to influence contemporary photographers, filmmakers, fashion designers, and make-up artists. Cowboy Kate & Other Stories or 'Kate' as the book is often referred to, had its place in photographic history cemented in 2005 when the International Center of Photography in New York included the book in their exhibition The Open Book: A History of the Photographic Book from 1878 to the Present. November Girl contained key image collages which formed the basis of many graphic and surrealist experiments in the 1970s and 1980s. African Imagewas a visual homage to the indigenous people, culture, landscape and wildlife of sub-Saharan Africa. The images represent a lifelong interest in photographing graphically stimulating environments and formally document his passion for the indigenous craft. He broke bones on river rapids and wrote off two Volvo saloon cars on African dirt roads while shooting the book. Despite its international award, this meticulously constructed book, celebrating a love for sub-Saharan Africa, is probably the least known of his major creative projects, but it is coveted by serious collectors of African art and photography. In 1968, Haskins moved to London and ran a studio in Glebe Place just off the King's Road. He worked as an advertising photographer for international consumer brands Asahi Pentax, Bacardi, Cutty Sark whisky, Honda, BMW, Haig whisky, DeBeers, British Airways, Unilever and Zanders, and specialised in the art direction and shooting of calendars, especially for Asahi Pentax in Japan. Although he endorsed Hasselblad for a short period in the late 1960s and early 1970s, his loyalty to the medium format 6x7 camera and lenses from Asahi resulted in a rare long-term association between a camera manufacturer and photographer. From 1970 to 2000, Asahi Optical (later Pentax) produced 30 calendars, of which Haskins shot and art-directed 15 editions including the millennium calendar. No other photographer was invited to contribute more than once. He is still involved with the Pentax Forum Gallery in Tokyo, which hosts his exhibitions. His first contact came in 1967, when Asahi Optical presented him with a 35 mm camera after hearing that he had shot African Image with various competitors' products. In 1972, he produced his first colour book, Haskins Posters. The large-format publication contained pages printed on one side using thick stiff paper and a soft glue perfect binding allowing the pages to be removed and used as posters. Haskins and Alida successfully published the book internationally through their own company, Haskins Press. The book won a gold award at the New York One Show. At the time the best-known image from Haskins Posters, a girl's face superimposed on an apple with a bee near the stem, appeared on the cover or in editorials of almost every major photographic magazine around the world. This image was part of a well-publicised visual and graphic experimentation with the apple theme in the 1970s that for a while resulted in photographic journalists nicknaming him 'Sam the Apple man'. He suffered a stroke on 19 September 2009 the opening day of his exhibition to launch Fashion Etcetera at Milk Gallery in New York, and died at home in Bowral, Australia, nine weeks later.Source: Wikipedia
Lilian Caruana
United States
"As an immigrant from Italy growing up in New York, I was drawn to observing people and fascinated by differences in cultural behavior. I saw myself always faced with the dilemma of interpreting and reconciling home country with adopted country norms and behavior. Things that were perfectly normal in one culture could be foreign, even problematic, in the other. I developed “antennas” having to constantly read and interpret cultural cues or nuances in interactions with people. This feeling of being an outsider made me want to know more about people, how they lived, what they believed in. Seeking this, anthropology has been a lifelong study that I explore photographically. Photography has served as a passport that allows me entry to worlds normally closed to me. The central theme of my photography is individuals who are outside the mainstream of the larger society. I have photographed immigrants, punks and skinheads, Austrian farmers in the Italian Alps, inner city youth and gang members. My work explores how individuals who, either by choice or because they are seen as “the other,” live outside the dominant culture. My goal is to explore how individuals shape their identity and give voice to their own existence." REBELS: Punks and Skinheads of New York’s East Village "New York’s East Village has always been a haven for strivers, a home for immigrants, artists, poets and later the place where the punk movement was born. In 1984 I moved there and was fascinated by the young people walking around sporting body metal, torn clothing, tatoos, and chains. I photographed them in the streets, in the abandoned buildings they called home and in the clubs like CBGB where they played their hardcore music. These were young people who were looking for a more authentic way to be and did not see a place for themselves in mainstream society. It was exciting to see, in what appeared to be squalor and dissolution, something being born. With grit and ingenuity they took vacant lots filled with rubble and turned them into urban gardens, abandoned buildings into housing, and anger into art, music and community. Despite the drugs, poverty, and violence that battered the East Village at the time, the creative response was there, raw and beautiful, and that is what interested me."
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All About Photo Awards 2026
Win a Solo Exhibition in February
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Marijn Fidder is a Dutch documentary photographer whose work powerfully engages with current affairs and contemporary social issues. Driven by a deep sense of social justice, she uses photography to speak on behalf of the voiceless and to advocate for the rights of those who are most vulnerable. Her images have been widely published in major international outlets including National Geographic, CNN Style, NRC Handelsblad, Volkskrant, GUP New Talent, and ZEIT Magazin. Her long-term commitment to disability rights—particularly through years of work in Uganda—culminated in her acclaimed project Inclusive Nation, which earned her the title of Photographer of the Year 2025 at the All About Photo Awards. She is also the recipient of multiple prestigious honors, including awards from World Press Photo and the Global Peace Photo Award. We asked her a few questions about her life and work.
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Call for Entries
All About Photo Awards 2026
$5,000 Cash Prizes! Juror: Steve McCurry