I'm taking of the Instagram-account of the renowned, Amsterdam-based FotoLabKiekie! The famous photo laboratorium isn't just the go-to place in Amsterdam to get a picture professionally printed, they're also the creators of the quarterly published Kiekie Tabloid. On the side, they run a pretty neat Instagram account, where they mainly focus on featuring young talent. This week, until July 16th, I'll be posting some of my best work on their account. Check it out!
Streets of New York keeps on getting positive attention in the world press - German daily Süddeutsche Zeitung has written an article about the MENDO book in the Saturday edition of their newspaper. The article in one of Germany's biggest newspapers focuses on my editorial journey to find new angles and perspectives on The Big Apple. You can read the article about MENDO's and teNeues' 'Bildband' through this link, or check out the plain text below. The headline, 'Der Reiz des Neuen' translates to 'The Charm of the New'.
Kein Ort der Welt ist so schwierig einzufangen mit der Kamera wie New York: "Jeder Zentimeter", schreibt Joost Bastmeijer in der Einleitung zu dem Bildband "Streets of New York", ist "schon dokumentiert worden". Andererseits verändert sich die Stadt viel schneller als andere, bietet also stets neue Motive. Und jeder Neuankömmling, jeder Besucher sucht nach einer eigenen Perspektive.
Bastmeijer hat sich durch unzählige Online-Portfolios und Instagram-Accounts geklickt auf der Suche nach Fotografen, die tatsächlich neue, eigene Bilder-Geschichten finden. Er ist tatsächlich - zwischen Unmengen immer gleicher Aufnahmen - fündig geworden. 40 Fotografen sind mit ihren Werken in "Streets of New York" vertreten, nicht alle Szenen sind wirklich originell. Viele aber doch. Deren Stärke ist, dass sie sich nicht im Absonderlichen verlieren. Es sei, so Bastmeijer, immer darum gegangen, dass der Betrachter jedes Mal einen typischen New-York-Moment erkennt. Casey Tang, der mit Bildern in dem Band vertreten ist, bemerkt dazu: "Gute Fotografie wahrt eine Balance zwischen Vertrautheit und Neuem." Drei größere Linien fallen auf: Manhattan wird nicht mehr so sehr von unten, sondern zumeist von oben fotografiert. Das unterirdische New York übt offenbar einen starken Reiz aus. Und viele Künstler fotografieren durch ein Motiv im Vordergrund hindurch etwas Dahinterliegendes - Sinnbild für die ständige Überschreibung des Stadtbildes.
Two of the books I have recently worked on for MENDO and teNeues are featured in this month's Glamour Magazine! Both Streets of New York as This Is Not a F*cking Street Style Book can be seen in this month's edition. For both books, I was in charge of the editorial coordination. Next to the page-big picture by Stijn Hoekstra, the Dutch text says: "From 5th Avenue till Washington Street in Brooklyn; coffee table book 'Streets of New York' shows the inspiring diversity of the Big Five". You can read both articles here, via Blendle.
As a (freelance) Content Manager for Nairobi-based travel startup Charlie's Travels, I'm responsible for all outgoing content, both textual as audiovisual. One of the big tasks for the Content & Marketing team is the expansion of 'CT', from a student travel agency to a responsible, grown-up travel agency for off the beaten track trips to Eastern and Southern Africa.
Charlie's Travels has already organized lots of trips for families over the past few years, but it's the student image that sticks. That's why our content team member Yuri made a kick-ass new video of an off the beaten track trip that Sido and Saskia and their grown-up children made through Kenya!
The video above marks the kick off of Charlie's Travels video campaign, which we're pushing on Facebook, where the vid already reached over 22k people. Check out the Charlie's Travels Facebook page or the site's blog page if you'd like to see more unique content, made by my colleagues and me.
Les Others has published six pages with my pictures and texts in their French-English magazine! Their 'Volume VI' issue is dubbed 'The Radical Issue', and so they have featured the pictures I took in Norway, when I captured an ice swim of Trygve. He's a bearded Norseman who froze his grandfather because he believes that if you keep a corpse cold enough, it will at some point in time be possible to resuscitate it. He also thinks that ice baths are healthy for anyone who is still alive, and that’s why he went for a swim in the middle of the harsh winter.
'The Radical Issue' is for sale via the Les Others website - they ship worldwide. One of the pictures was featured and auctioned by the Australian web page The Adventure Handbook.
I'm proud to be a part of the newest lovechild of MENDO, Adam Katz Sinding and teNeues Publishing: 'This Is Not A Fucking Streetstyle Book'. The book features the amazing and fashionable pictures of Adam, aka 'Le 21eme'. My colleague Mikel was in charge of the texts and interviewed Adam Katz Sinding and Virgil Abloh. The editorial coordination was my responsibility.
As I'm writing this, Adam is flying over the world to launch the book in the following (insanely cool) stores: The Broken Arm (Paris), KM20 (Moscow), STORY (Tel Aviv), The Room By Basmatée (Prague), Boonteshop (Seoul), GR8 (Tokyo), JUICE (Hong Kong), Harrolds (Sydney), 424 (Los Angeles), STORM (Copenhagen), SMETS (Luxembourg), BASTIEN (Madrid), THE STORE, Soho House (Berlin), VIER (Antwerp), KITH (New York City) and of course MENDO & Olaf Hussein (Amsterdam).
The book is for sale at the above listed stores and online, in the award winning MENDO webshop. Check out this article by VICE to read more about the book and the tour.
For 'Veel Liefs Uit Holland', my partner Saskia and I directed and filmed the Nairobi bit of the final episode. Five expats from all over the world tried to find a partner through this Dutch reality TV show and we followed Nairobi-based Joep, who eventually met his girlfriend Thirsa through the program. They have been living together for some months now, so we visited the couple to film how they're doing.
'Veel Liefs Uit Holland' is produced by John de Mol's Talpa and aired on Dutch television stations Net 5 and SBS 9. You can check out the bit we have worked on here, from 52:30.
With MENDO and teNeues, we made a photo book about New York City! 'Streets of New York' boasts over 250 pages of pictures taken by 40 contemporary photographers, selected by me and my MENDO colleagues Roy and Joost. I have written everything from the foreword, to the interviews, to the captions and the back cover blurp. I'm extremely proud of this first book in the 'Streets Of'-series and it's therefor extra cool that I'll be the Editorial Coordinator for two more books in the same series, featuring Amsterdam and Paris!
"More than 60 million people visit New York City each year. Every single traveler experiences the city in a unique way. There is no such thing as one New York. Streets of New York is a New York photo book that celebrates the Big Apple's tremendous diversity by bringing together over 40 contemporary photographers and their multiple perspectives on this unique metropolis. Often drawing on a strong social media presence, each photographer offers her or his personal take on New York's unparalleled vibrancy, impact, and allure, creating both a rich collection of city photography and street style, and a visual catalogue of New York travel inspirations. Photographs of world-renowned New York landmarks and attractions like the Empire State Building, Brooklyn Bridge, and World Trade Center Transportation Hub are interspersed with pictures of New York's hidden treasures, tucked-away Manhattan charms, and lesser known, but equally interesting New York City districts-all captured with a present-day attention to detail and a wide-eyed love for the City that Never Sleeps."
You can read some more about the contemporary city portrait on MENDO's blog, where I featured four 'Streets of New York' photographers. The book is for sale worldwide: you can get your hands on a copy via the Amazon, Bol, MENDO and teNeues websites. See the 'Books' page to read about other photo books I have worked on previously.
Did you already notice the new tab of this website? I have made a small collection of brands, print media and other outlets that have published or featured my work. On the 'Features' page, you can see a bunch of logos that you can click on, leading you to the article, blogpost, publication or assignment in case.
Radio host Thomas van Vliet asked me some questions about Kenya this morning, in his NPO Radio 1 show called 'Fris!'. We talked for about fifteen minutes about life in Nairobi, politics, photography, our flooded apartment and my work! You can listen to the interview through this link. For the non-Dutchies: NPO Radio 1 is the biggest news and sports radio station of The Netherlands, and also my previous employer. And so this interview is in Dutch as well.. Sorry about that!
Ha! Time for some humblebragging: the official Instagram account of Apple just featured one of my pictures on their account (with 4.5 million followers)! I took the above photo in the garden of Charlie's Travels - this chameleon wasn't too impressed though.
You'll find more features, collaborations and assignments on the 'Features' page.
When I traveled through Ivory Coast, Mali and Senegal a bit more than a year ago, Diane Audrey Ngako asked me to take over her @visiterlafrique Instagram account, which "documents rare, hidden hotspots on the continent and disrupts tourism", according to Quartz Africa. Later on, she asked me if she could feature one of the posted photos in the book she made: 'They call it Africa, we call it home'. You can see the result of our collaboration on the pictures and video above! I haven't gotten my hands on my copy yet, so I have stolen some pictures photographer Yasmine Ferdjani uploaded to her Instagram story. I took this photo on Gorée Island, near Senegal's capital Dakar. I uploaded the picture with the following caption on Instagram:
The easygoing island vibe, the friendly people spending their day outside, the crumbling down, colored colonial buildings - Île de Gorée is easily one of the prettiest places we've visited during our trip. This nice island has a gruesome history, though. Because the European colons were initially afraid of attacks and diseases on Africa's main land, they used the islands near the coasts as their bases. That's how Île de Gorée, 3 kilometers from Dakar, eventually became an important center for the slave trade. You can still visit the infamous and impressive 'Maison des Esclaves', where you can learn that also the Dutch have occupied the island, and that they're responsible for Gorée's name: they once named it after the Dutch island of Goeree, which stands for 'Goede Reede' ('Good Port').
You'll find more features, collaborations and assignments on the 'Features' page.
Suleyman Azhari of online platform 'Dion Ys Us' asked me to put some thoughts on paper about my recent trip to India. These words, alongside a selection of the pictures I took in the country, have been published on his page - click here to check it out!
You'll find more features, collaborations and assignments on the 'Features' page.
