Stay ConnectedFortnightly in-depth interviews featuring a diverse range of talented, innovative, world-class photographers from established, award-winning and internationally exhibited stars to young and emerging talents discussing their lives, work and process with fellow photographer, Ben Smith. The most recent 50 episodes are on this free feed, 200+ more are in the archive!
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Tony Dočekal (Amsterdam, 1992) is a photographer and visual artist. Her work explores identity, belonging, and the friction between autonomy and societal expectations. Working intuitively, she combines personal encounters with quiet observations. Her images balance intimacy and distance, often showing how personal stories and landscapes reflect larger systems.
Tony’s first book, The Color of Money and Trees, was published by VOID in 2024 and launched at Paris Photo. The work was also exhibited at Biennale Images Vevey alongside her debut short film, Pearls on Credit. She holds a BA in Fine Arts from ArtEZ University of the Arts.
In episode 263 Tony discusses, among other things:
Referenced:
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John Rankin Waddell, or just Rankin, as he is more commonly known, is a British photographer, publisher, and film director. Best known for work that is on the cultural cusp and leading future trends, he has produced rule-breaking campaigns for brands such as Rolls Royce, Unilever, L’Oréal, Lego, and Samsonite; created wide-reaching projects for charities including Women’s Aid and Macmillan; and shot music videos for the likes of Miley Cyrus, Rita Ora, and Kelis.
As a photographer, Rankin’s portfolio ranges from portraiture to documentary. He has shot The Rolling Stones, David Bowie, Kate Moss, Kendall Jenner, Zendaya and Queen Elizabeth II, to name only a few. In 2023, Rankin photographed King Charles III to mark the monarch’s 75th birthday for The Big Issue magazine.
As a publisher, Rankin co-founded the seminal magazine Dazed & Confused with Jefferson Hack in 1990, and has since published the likes of AnOther and AnOther Man, alongside over 40 books and the fashion and culture publication Hunger.
His photography has been published everywhere from his own publications to Elle, Vogue, Esquire, GQ, Rolling Stone, and Wonderland, and exhibited in galleries globally, including MoMA, New York, and the Victoria & Albert Museum, London.
Rankin lives in London with his wife Tuuli and their dogs.
In episode 262 Rankin discusses, among other things:
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Marjolein Martinot is a Dutch photographer, based in France. She was always been drawn to photography from an early age, and has continued using and exploring the medium throughout her life, while raising a family of six children. Her photography touches on the poetic, while striving to remain authentic and true at the same time. She aims to evoke sentiments by using and mixing different photographic approaches and analogue cameras. The prime focus of Marjolein’s work is on everyday life: family, friends, and the places and things that touch her. She currently works on personal projects and commissions. Her debut photobook, Riverland, was very recently published by Stanley Barker. On whose website the blurb states:
“During times of darkness and moments of deep turmoil in her personal life, Dutch photographer and mother of six, Marjolein Martinot, found herself lost, searching for a renewed sense of self. Each evening, she sought solace in nature, walking to a nearby river in the South of France with her camera in hand. There, she captured the quiet beauty of the natural world in the golden light of dusk, forming connections with the animals and families she encountered at the river’s edges—jumping, splashing, climbing, and swinging from the trees.
What began as a ritual of aimless wandering and photographing soon became a form of visual journaling—a quiet meditation on healing and transformation. The water, ever-flowing and unpredictable, mirrored her own emotional state, while the families she met, however briefly, embodied the warmth and belonging she longed for.
Through these intimate, unguarded moments—children mid-leap, ripples catching the last light of day, trees bending towards the water, and horses galloping in the fading glow—Martinot began to piece together a new sense of self. Her photographs, though deeply personal, transcend autobiography, offering a universal reflection on resilience, connection, and the subtle magical beauty of the everyday.”
In episode 261, Marjolein discusses, among other things:
Referenced:
EPISODE SPONSORS:
CHARCOAL WORKSHOPS.
THE ‘SUMMER SERIES’ TAKING PLACE IN PORTLAND, MAINE, SEPTEMBER 15-19, 2025.
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PICDROP
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Anna Arendt is a photographer and visual artist living and working in Berlin whose images explore memory, silence, loss, and the invisible links between personal history and larger events. Her work often moves between personal, historical, and symbolic worlds, shot in black-and-white to capture places where the past and present meet.
Anna was born in the German Democratic Republic and was 24 when The Wall fell, at which time her daughter was two. Her parents were born 1940 in Germany, children of war. Both of her grandfathers had been soldiers, who had been in Poland between 1940 and 1942. One came back 2 years after the war was over, the other one never returned.
As a child Anna found a secret shelf that contained photo albums of her family. "It is where I discovered the power of a picture. A picture taken in summer 1940. A young family, my grandmother, her baby and my grandfather in a German uniform. A picture full of contradictions, carrying ambivalent feelings even today."
Anna graduated with a degree in Fine Arts and Set Design and then received a one-year grant from the DAAD to study photography at the School of Visual Arts in New York. For 15 years, she worked as a set and costume designer for opera, drama, and puppet theater, collaborating with directors at theaters across Germany and Switzerland.
Anna recently published her first book, Vanishing, with Charcoal Press. Photographed mostly between Germany and Poland over 15 years, the work slides back and forth through time like a blood memory. Walking naked through the dark forest, wolves circling, howling. A daughter becoming a mother becoming a grandmother becoming a child. Haunted villages, and souls in jeopardy. The harsh reality of the past merges seamlessly with moments of rapture that feel plucked from a Grimm fairy tale.
Photography has now become the center of Anna’s creative life. She continues to develop long-term projects that reflect her search for meaning in places marked by beauty, pain, and the mysteries of time. Alongside her artistic work, she also works with disabled people in an art workshop, sharing the joy of creative expression.
In episode 260, Anna discusses, among other things:
EPISODE SPONSORS:
CHARCOAL WORKSHOPS.
THE ‘SUMMER SERIES’ TAKING PLACE IN PORTLAND, MAINE, SEPTEMBER 15-19, 2025.
FEATURING: ANTOINE D’AGATA, TODD HIDO AND CHRISTIAN PATERSON. SIGN UP AT THE LINK!
PICDROP
THE EASIEST WAY TO SHARE PHOTO AND VIDEO SHOOTS. CREATE HIGHLY PROFESSIONAL PHOTO GALLERIES IN SECONDS AND LET YOUR CLIENTS DOWNLOAD, SELECT AND COMMENT ON THEIR FAVOURITE SHOTS. SIGN UP WITH THE CODE “ASMALLVOICE” FOR A TWO-MONTH FREE TRIAL!
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Mohamed Bourouissa is an Algerian-born French artist (b. 1978) who lives and works in Paris. Mohamed's practice moves between photography, video, sculpture, and installation, often blurring the lines between these mediums. His work explores social issues, power dynamics, and the representation of marginalized communities.
He often engages with or embeds himself into specific communities for extended periods, spending significant time with individuals and groups to understand their experiences and perspectives before then creating collaborative works that challenge societal structures and explore the complexities of identity.
Mohamed's work frequently addresses the tensions between different social contexts, particularly those related to race, class, and immigration, often questioning how different social groups are represented in media and art, challenging stereotypes and seeking to offer alternative narratives.
His work has been exhibited in major museums and biennials worldwide, and in 2020 he received the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize for his retrospective exhibition featured in the Arles Festival the previous year.
Mohamed currently has a major solo show at Fondazione MAST in Bologna Italy, curated by Francesco Zanot. The exhibition is entitled Communautés and features four notable works produced over a twenty year span between 2005 and this year - Péripherique, Horse Day, Shoplifters and Hands.
In episode 259, Mohamed discusses, among other things:
Referenced:
EPISODE SPONSORS:
CHARCOAL WORKSHOPS.
THE ‘SUMMER SERIES’ TAKING PLACE IN PORTLAND, MAINE, SEPTEMBER 15-19, 2025.
FEATURING: ANTOINE D’AGATA, TODD HIDO AND CHRISTIAN PATERSON. SIGN UP AT THE LINK!
PICDROP
THE EASIEST WAY TO SHARE PHOTO AND VIDEO SHOOTS. CREATE HIGHLY PROFESSIONAL PHOTO GALLERIES IN SECONDS AND LET YOUR CLIENTS DOWNLOAD, SELECT AND COMMENT ON THEIR FAVOURITE SHOTS. SIGN UP WITH THE CODE “ASMALLVOICE” FOR A TWO-MONTH FREE TRIAL!
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Paul Seawright is Professor of Photography and Deputy Vice Chancellor at Ulster University in Northern Ireland. His photographic work is held in many museum collections including The Irish Museum of Modern Art, Tate, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, International Centre of Photography New York, Arts Councils of Ireland, England and N.Ireland, UK Government Collection and the Museum of Contemporary Art Rome. In 2002 he was commissioned by the Imperial War Museum London to undertake a war art commission in Afghanistan and his photographs of battle-sites and minefields have subsequently been exhibited in North America, Canada, Ireland, Spain, France, Germany, Korea, Japan and China. In 2003 he represented Wales at the Venice Biennale of Art and in 1997 won the Irish Museum of Modern Art/Glen Dimplex Prize. He is represented by the Kerlin Gallery Dublin.
Paul was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2020 Birthday Honours for services to higher education and the arts.
In episode 258, Paul discusses, among other things:
Referenced:
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“‘Allusive documentary’ is probably a good way to think about it. For me, it’s really about - and this is the bit that goes back to my experience of photography in Northern Ireland, which was all about dramacentric imagery - how you can make photographs that have a documentary subject (that might be the closest I come to being a documentarian, that I work with the subject of documentary photography) but with the methodology of an artist. That’s kind of the way I like to frame it, and I think that follows through to the work which is nearly always conceived for the gallery wall.”
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Featuring:
Featured in the Positions exhibition:
Adam Rouhana (@adam.rouhana), Aikaterini Gegisian (@aikaterini_gegisian), Babak Kazemi (@babakkazemi1), Bibi Manavi (@bibimanavi), Ippolita Paolucci (@ippolitapaolucci), Kalpesh Lathigra (@kalpeshlathigra), Karim El Hayawan (@karimelhayawan), Mieke Douglas (@miekedouglas) and Roberto Conde (@robconde33)
Photo London Website | Instagram
Peckham24/A Bigger Book Fair Website | Instagram
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London-born British photographer Marc Wilson’s images document the memories, histories and stories that are set in the landscapes that surround us. His long term documentary projects include The Last Stand (2010-2014), A Wounded Landscape - bearing witness to the Holocaust (2015-2021) and The Land is Yellow, the Sky is Blue (2021-2023).
Marc’s aim is to tell stories through his photography, focusing at times on the landscape itself, and the objects found on and within it, and sometimes combining landscape, documentary, portrait and still life, along with audio recordings of interviews and sounds, to portray the mass sprawling web of the histories and stories he is hoping to tell.
Marc has published 6 photo books - Travelogue 2 (2024), The Land is Yellow, the Sky is Blue (2023), Remnants (2022), A Wounded Landscape - bearing witness to the Holocaust (2021), Travelogue 1 (2018), and The Last Stand (2014).
Solo exhibitions include those at Impressions Gallery, Bradford, Side Gallery, Newcastle, The Royal Armouries Museum and Focal point Gallery in the UK and Spazio Klien in Italy.
Marc’s work has been published in journals and magazines ranging from National Geographic, FT Weekend, Leica LFI, Source, Raw Magazine, Wired, Dezeen and others, he also works as a visiting lecturer at various universities in the UK and has given talks about his work both in the UK and abroad.
In episode 256, Marc discusses, among other things:
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Mackenzie Calle is a freelance documentary photographer and National Geographic Explorer based in Brooklyn. In 2024, she was awarded first prize in the World Press Photo Open Format category award (North & Central America) for her project the Gay Space Agency, and was a finalist for the Sony World Photography Awards.
She was selected as a Magnum Foundation Counter Histories Fellow in 2022. That same year, she was named one of the Lenscratch 25 to Watch and was shortlisted for the PhMuseum Women Photographers Grant. In 2023, she was named as a Lens Culture Emerging Talent Award winner and received the Dear Dave Fellowship.
Mackenzie is a graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts with a degree in Cinema Studies and was awarded the Director’s Fellowship to attend ICP’s Documentary Practice and Visual Journalism Program. She was selected to Eddie Adams Workshop class XXXV. She is an Adjunct Lecturer at CUNY’s College of Staten Island. Prior to her freelance career, she was a photo producer at NBC Universal.
Her work has been exhibited at Fotografiska Stockholm, Photoville, Pride Photo Festival, and Noorderlicht International Photo Festival.
Clients include National Geographic, The Washington Post, GAYLETTER, Discovery, MSNBC, and The Wall Street Journal.
In episode 255, Mackenzie discusses, among other things:
Referenced:
“For me, it’s letting the story tell me what it needs. So it’s not so much going in with a preconceived notion. You obviously go into most stories with some idea of what you’re going to do, but every idea I have, that work in itself almost reveals or tells me kind of what it should be. So sometimes that means fiction, sometimes that does mean straight photojournalism, sometimes that means entirely imagined and staged projects…”
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Tomasz Tomaszewski has a Ph.D from the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, and is a member of the Union of Polish Art Photographers, the Visum Archiv Agency of Hamburg, Germany, the National Geographic Creative Agency of Washington D.C., and the American Society of Media Photographers.
He specializes in journalistic photography and has had his photos published in major newspapers and magazines worldwide including National Geographic Magazine, Stern, Paris Match, GEO, New York Times, Time, Fortune, Elle, Vogue. He has also authored a number of books, including Remnants: The Last Jews of Poland, Gypsies: The Last Ones; In Search of America, In the Centre, Astonishing Spain, A Stone’s Throw, Overwhelmed by the Atmosphere of Kindness, Things that last, and has co-illustrated over a dozen collective works.
He has held numerous individual exhibitions in the USA, Canada, Israel, Japan, Brazil, Madagascar, the Netherlands, Germany, France, Italy, Indonesia and Poland. Tomasz is the recipient of many Polish and international awards for photography. For over thirty years he has been a regular contributor to National Geographic Magazine USA in which eighteen of his photo essays have been published. Tomasz has taught photography in Poland, the USA, Germany and Italy.
Tomasz’smost recent book, The World Is Where You Stop was published in 2023 by Blow Up Press.
In episode 254, Tomasz discusses, among other things:
Referenced:
Website | Instagram | Interview in ‘Hot Mirror’
“Most of the time when I was working for Geographic, I wanted my photographs to serve a purpose, to tell a story, or explain a person to another human being. But this time I only wanted to capture surprise, maybe, wonder, occassionally joy, amusement, but also discomfort. In short, anything but a desire to tell a story.”
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