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Win a Solo Exhibition in April 2026!
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Federico Tisa
Federico Tisa
Federico Tisa

Federico Tisa

Country: Italy
Birth: 1982

I studied Architecture at the Polytechnic of Turin, Italy and only after the University did I have the courage to take a path that I really loved.

So I studied photography at an Academy in my home town.

I Started to shoot and practice under the stages of big concerts, having the opportunity to shoot for important national and international music magazines and go to the shows of artists like Ben Harper, Pearl Jam, Nick Cave, Leonard Cohen, P.J Harvey, Ennio Morricone and others.

Only later, in 2013 after having participated as a visitor to a photojournalism festival, I decided that I wanted to take that road and so I studied reportage in Milan and later in Rome.

From 2014 I'll be carrying out long term projects.
 

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More Great Photographers To Discover

Stephen Albair
United States
1942
Stephen Albair was born in Massachusetts and raised in New Hampshire. He currently lives and works in San Francisco. Educated at Illinois State University in Design, he is a self-taught photographer, lecturer and a college teacher, for over 40 years. His work in tableau photography began in 1974 with the purchase of a 35mm Nikkormat, which has remained the only camera for his work. Numerous exhibitions and installations have been staged in the US and Thailand. He has authored three books with a fourth book currently in progress. The images are mostly rooted in memoir built on found objects with Art Historical references. The focus is not so much on a series of images but rather a board range of subject matter, from early memories, to the current political landscape. His photos represent intuitive responses to ideas through self-reflection. By mastering the techniques of tableaux photography he has created a significant body of work that have enhanced his skill as an artist and storyteller. Statement Photography is a unique way of seeing the world. Life's ambiguities, love, loss, and longing, are my subject matter. These ideas evolve through a meaningful search for content, with no specific audience in mind. Ultimately, an audience perceives all content based on their own personal experiences. Familiar objects trigger our memory, reminding us of how we understand the world. I constantly search for unique objects that speak to me. My set-ups are arranged to illustrate an intention, an action that something has just happened -or is about to. Tableau photography provides the stage, much like actors in a play. The procedure of building a photograph creates an air of playfulness that allows for a different way of thinking about common human experiences. The audience is delivered thought-provoking ideas tinged with humor in a fabricated world. This process playfully exposing the surreal nature of reality and questions what is real or simply realistic—leaving the viewer to decide. Articles: Hidden Gardens - Secret Views SPECTACLES: A Memoir of Jewelry and Photography Miss Nude World For the Love of DOGS
Ralph Milewski
Germany
1968
My name is Ralph Milewski, and I am a passionate photographer from Germany. Born with Limb-Girdle Muscular Dystrophy (LGMD), despite significant physical limitations, I have found my creative voice. My photographic journey is marked by the fixed positioning of my camera between my legs, just 27 inches above the ground. Photography, for me, is not just a creative passion but a window to art and self-expression. As an introverted individual with a strong curiosity for people and their stories, I find in photography a unique way to simultaneously create intimacy and distance. The camera, my tool of choice, becomes the medium that strengthens my self-confidence and elevates my self-worth. Despite moments of frustration and grappling with my own limits, photography motivates me to creatively transcend my physical constraints and achieve extraordinary results. My work not only provides insights into my world from an unconventional perspective but also invites a reevaluation of existing perceptions. Photography, for me, is more than a visual medium; it keeps my mind alert and inspires me to develop bold ideas, even if their realization often relies on support. Photography compels me out of my comfort zone, helps me overcome social anxieties, and facilitates the forging of new connections. My view of the world through the lens is unique and perhaps exactly what can enrich your photo project. I invite you to consider my photography as a contribution to your project, not out of pity for my disability, but as an enrichment through a distinctive perspective and the creative process that I infuse into each image. Rear Seat Diaries: The series "Perspectives in Motion" is derived from my "Rear Seat Diaries," captured from a moving car – my wheelchair-accessible VW Caddy with a rear ramp. Let me briefly explain the unique setting of these window shots: I sit in my electric wheelchair at the back of my Caddy, facing forward. Until recently, the camera was always fixed on a tripod (gooseneck) attached to my wheelchair, positioned higher in the car to be at eye level with the window. I now use a mini-tripod, which I can position in my left hand, supported on my wheelchair. The camera is positioned at a right angle to me, aimed at the side window of the Caddy. The camera was adjusted and set before the trip began. Due to my physical limitations, I couldn't operate the camera in this elevated position directly. With the mini-tripod, I can now adjust the camera settings during the ride. I trigger the shots via remote control. I can only see the camera display sideways in my field of view, as it is flipped up 180°. The shots are taken while driving. Since the wheelchair is not firmly connected to the vehicle, it is subjected to stronger vibrations and centrifugal forces. Overall, it's a pretty bumpy affair. The idea for this project gradually developed out of necessity. If I could lift my arms like any other person, this series probably wouldn't have come about in this form. From my elevated position in the car, I can only visually capture a small part of the surroundings. I can turn my head slightly left and right but cannot move my shoulders or the wheelchair in the desired direction. Photographing from a moving car proved challenging, especially with a phone and a selfie stick. The results were unsatisfactory as the car window frame was always partially and never fully in the picture. The actual development began on the way to Spain in 2022, when I tried to dedicate photos of his hometown Lyon to a street photographer friend while passing through. Despite improvements to the selfie stick's position, there were still limitations. A few months later, I began photographing my hometown this way. By chance, I moved the phone further away from the car window. Upon later review, I noticed some pictures had the entire window frame as a frame. This caught my attention when I manually corrected the perspective with Lightroom in early February 2023. Since then, I have been continuously working on optimizing and further developing this project. Using an APS-C camera with an extended tripod attached to the wheelchair brought new insights. The mini-tripod and the ability to now change camera settings during the ride have sparked a creative boost. Despite challenges such as reflections, unwanted mirror images, sunlight, and disruptive elements like smeared or rainy windows affecting autofocus. Manual focusing is impossible as I can operate the camera very limitedly, and the subject constantly changes while driving. A self-built shading device now minimizes some reflections. However, there are still difficulties with backlighting and dirt on the windows. The "Rear Seat Diaries" present a diverse mix of my travels and experiences. I invite people to explore this unique perspective and see the world through my windows. It has long become an ongoing project, constantly being developed. Most of the shots are taken during my everyday trips, like drives to the grocery store or the doctor. Occasionally, I make specific trips just for photography. Targeted subject selection requires a lot of planning and time, especially since I need someone willing to drive me when I want to. The compiled images include beginnings with the phone, first steps, and the development with an APS-C camera, up to the latest attempts within the "Rear Seat Diaries" series to create intentional blur in the foreground through motion effects using extended exposure times. This approach aims to depict the outer environment in dynamic blur while keeping the subframe, the interior of the car, deliberately sharp. The challenge lies in the unavoidable vibrations caused by the vehicle while driving, complicating this endeavor. Nevertheless, longer exposure times are deliberately experimented with to add a dynamic and artistic dimension to the images.
Patricia Lagarde
Patricia Lagarde was born in Mexico City, where she currently lives and works. Studies in Communication and Graphic Design. She develops in the middle of photography from an early age. Her work revolves around three fundamental axes; the object as a symbol, the construction of memory and the poetics of space. Her images and artist books have been shown in Museums, Galleries and Fairs in various countries around the world. In Mexico it is represented by Patricia Conde Galería, in San Francisco by The Jack Fischer Gallery. Statement Patricia Lagarde's work is akin to that imaginary construction of an excessive, circular notion of time found in the most conspicuous narratives of magical realism. She grabs such epic dimension of time and submits it to an intimate experience. The signs she works with have no great scenarios of history as spatial references but rather much more discrete enclosures, such as the alchemist's laboratory, a cabinet of curiosities or an antiques collection. Objects that have been touched, used or abandoned are the most recurring personal motives throughout her career. Or perhaps we should say the “aura” of such objects, resulting from the way time has noticed them. Insects, toys, maps and spheres, ancient instruments, clothes, reproductions of works of art, other photographs and other texts are then taken to a ranking ground where the colossal and the tiny are confused, where the distinction between the own and the alien is no longer important, the imaginary and the real hierarchies are reversed and the meaning of usefulness loses relevance. (Author_Juan Antonio Molina)
Ruud van Empel
Netherlands
1958
Ruud van Empel (born 21 November 1958 in Breda) is a Dutch photographer and visual artist. He studied at the Academie voor Beeldende Kunst St. Joost (St Joost Academy of Art) in Breda in the 1970s, and began making independently produced videotapes in the eighties. He moved to Amsterdam in the late eighties to work on his career as a visual artist. His first photographic series were The Office (1995-2001), Study for Women (1999-2002) and Study in Green (2003). The Groninger Museum presented his first solo exhibition in 1999. He made his international breakthrough with his series World-Moon-Venus, which was shown in the George Eastman Museum in Rochester, New York State. Until mid-1995, Van Empel’s art was primarily generated by a process of assembling analogue photographic images. At that point, he exchanged this traditional collage technique – cutting, pasting and retouching in the darkroom – for image processing on the computer, working in an idea-driven manner. The first series created with this method was The Office (1995). In a technical sense, The Office displays a handicraft-like quality, missing the perfectionist character of his later work. Nevertheless, Ruud van Empel clearly demonstrated that his approach differed from other disciplines such as staged photography. In certain aspects, The Office offered a somewhat surrealistic character and referred to photomontages from the 1920s in terms of style and design. On the basis of this art-historical reference, Van Empel created a new genre within photography – without a ready-to-wear label. The artist himself speaks of the ‘construction of a photographic image’. Although he does make use of pure photomontage – he never applies so-called morphing techniques – the final result strives for content aligned to natural reality rather than to surrealism. The artificiality is visible but the final image is a convincing, autonomous reality. As a consequence, the work does not seem grotesque or absurd but could theoretically actually appear in reality. In that respect, Van Empel’s images are independent. They do not manifest themselves as ‘symbolic’ and have been stripped of all ‘pictorial’ associations. He does not deploy photography as a substitute for painting but rather uses it as an independent form of depiction. Every image consists of photographic sources that are digitally assembled on the computer. The work of Ruud van Empel exists by grace of the camera by means of which he records his building blocks. After The Office, he created the Study for Women series, which comprises a number of female portraits that refer to the magic realism art movement. In this series, produced in the period 2000-2002, he displayed the form language with which he would soon gain worldwide recognition. The Study in Green series from 2003-2004, the Untitled series from 2004, and the three closely related series World, Moon and Venus, which he began in 2005, represented Van Empel’s true international breakthrough. Curator Deborah Klochko invited him to participate in the exhibition entitled Picturing Eden in the George Eastman House. In the book Ruud van Empel Photoworks 1995-2010, she wrote: ‘Van Empel’s virtuosity lies in his capacity to combine in photography the kind of ideas anchored in painting (historical references, the power of a glimpse, use of colour) and cinema (structure with multiple images and the power of a narrative), and to do so on a large scale. To understand his work you must ask yourself: ‘Is it science or art? Is it real or imaginary? Is innocence or decadence?’ Particularly the World series, which explores the theme of innocence, made a deep impression. These works were inspired by photos taken by his father. Van Empel placed neatly dressed, black boys and girls in paradisical settings of unspoiled, non-existent natural surroundings. Great interest in and appreciation of this series are expressed worldwide to this day. The breakthrough in America also led to renewed attention in Dutch museums. Van Empel has had solo exhibitions in Museum Het Valkhof in Nijmegen, the Groninger Museum and the NoordBrabants Museum in ’s-Hertogenbosch. Since the international recognition of his work gave Ruud Van Empel the status of an artist with an own independent form language, he has progressively extended his oeuvre with the Theatre series from 2010-2013, and Souvenir, which provided a charged picture of his youth in Breda. This series was purchased by the NoordBrabants Museum. A typical feature of the work of Ruud van Empel is the composition of a perfected and idealized representation right down to the finest details. But this always has a darker side, albeit not always evident. Ruud Schenk, curator of the Groninger Museum, wrote about that aspect with reference to the Study for Women series (2000-2002): ‘As a spectator you feel that there is something not quite right about the depiction of the women: they are not completely lifelike, but tend to be a mixture of real women and window dummies. This generates a certain discomfort, an uneasiness that touches upon what was described as 'das Unheimliche' (the uncanny) at the beginning of the 20th century.’ Although the photographic images seem to capture an epoch, you can hardly assign a date to any of them. This timeless element of Van Empel’s work has taken on a different significance in his recent work, as he deals with themes such as transience and Vanity in his Still Life series from 2014, and also portrays older people as in the portrait of an older woman in the Sunday series (2012), or in the Nude series (2014), in which he questions the pose of the model and the aesthetics of nudity. In the Solo Work series, on which Ruud van Empel has been working since 2011, he consistently deals with just one topic in an isolated work. The moral, ethical and aesthetic dilemmas of society and art are presented to us in a photographic form language. The significance of these is shown in the countless publications and international exhibitions of this work, not only in institutions specialized in photography but also in renowned museums for modern visual art.Source: Wikipedia
Steve Toole
United States
1957
"I have enjoyed photography and art since I was young. I was fortunate to have traveled with my family throughout the United States as I was growing up. Taking pictures during those trips was an exciting and rewarding experience. Being semi-retired from teaching, I now have more time to rekindle my artistic pursuits. Much of my work depicts life outdoors, because that is where I spend a significant amount of my time. Capturing moments through photography, whether magnificent or understated, is more fulfilling now than ever. My wife Kim and I live in Ashton, Illinois where we foster rescued dogs, volunteer, teach part time, and enjoy small town life." About Back Roads: "There is a sense of timelessness when I travel the back roads of America. Two-lane blacktops and meandering gravel roads are the capillaries that carry me to those places that modernity has mostly ignored. For me, in these places, the sky is bigger, the earth is closer, and the air smells fresher. A feeling of tranquility exists there. Whether a bucolic scene, a sylvan setting or an alpine view, I am transported to a time and place that previous generations might have experienced. Black and white images contribute to that feeling of timelessness, whether depicting a leafless tree, a grazing horse, or an abandoned pick-up truck in a pasture. I hope my photos transport the viewer, even for a few moments, to these out-of-the-way places – sometimes beautiful, sometimes gritty, sometimes simple, sometimes unique, but always real." Awarded Photographer of the Week - Week 14
Dominique Isserman
Dominique Issermann (born April 11, 1947) is a French photographer. She works primarily with black and white photography, and is known for her works in portraits, fashion and advertising. She has shot campaigns for Sonia Rykiel, Christian Dior, Nina Ricci, Guess, Lancôme, La Perla, Tiffany, Chanel and many others. Her work has also been featured in the fashion supplements for The New York Times, Corriere Della Sera and Le Monde. Issermann is noted for having photographed Leonard Cohen over several decades. The two had a long relationship, and Cohen dedicated his album I'm Your Man to her.Source: Wikipedia Cinema has played a major role in the life and career of Paris-based photographer Dominique Issermann. This year’s recipient of the Lucie Award for Achievement in Fashion was majoring in literature at the Sorbonne when she moved to Rome with Daniel Cohn-Bendit, a student leader of the May 1968 protests in Paris, and French New Wave filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard to work on films. In the Italian capital, she co-directed the avant-garde films Tamaout and Elettra with Marc’O. Upon Issermann’s return to Paris in 1973, she produced a series of photo essays for Zoom magazine on the movie sets of Federico Fellini’s Casanova and Bernardo Bertolucci’s Novecento. In these formative years, she photographed up-and-coming and now-legendary actors, including Catherine Deneuve, Gérard Depardieu and Isabelle Adjani. In 1979, designer Sonia Rykiel hired Issermann to collaborate with her on advertising campaigns for her fashion line, which put her front and center in the world of mode. Fashion editorials for periodicals from American Vogue to Elle soon followed. Her work continues to flow seamlessly between fashion, portraiture and advertising campaigns for major brands from Chanel, Christian Dior, Lancôme and Yves Saint Laurent to GUESS, Victoria’s Secret, Tiffany & Co., and Hermès. In addition to shooting or directing commercials and shorts for some of these fashion and beauty houses, Issermann has created music videos with her signature free-flowing, yet immaculately framed shots.Source: Digital Photo Pro Along the way she also applies her distinctive style onto moving images for which she still has a prominent taste, directing several music videos for Leonard Cohen, notably Dance me & Manhattan – and shooting TV commercials for many of her clients, including the memorable Eau Sauvage and Dune for Christian Dior and the Victoria’s Secret legendary commercial featuring Bob Dylan. Her recent music collaborations also include work with Nick Cave. Dominique Issermann has published several books – one of which Laetitia Casta achieves considerable success – and exhibits her work around the world with major retrospectives at the Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie at Arles and at the Paris Maison Européenne de la Photographie, and recently at Paris’s Charles de Gaulle airport where 80 of her most famous pictures were exhibited on 400 digital advertising panels throughout all terminals. Her unique style has been praised by many, Dominique Issermann invents, in the black studio, a white light that seems to glow from under the skin of the characters and that the schools of photography teach under the name of Light Issermann. Amongst the many accolades she has received for her work, Dominique Issermann is the first woman to receive the equivalent of an Oscar for her fashion photography at the 1987 French Fashion Awards. In January 2007, she was promoted to the rank of Officer of France’s Order of Arts and Letter and in March 2012, she was named to the National Order of Merit.Source: The Lucie Awards
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AAP Magazine #55 Women
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