My goal is to use photography as a means to communicate effectively and accurately across borders to create bridges of understanding in an increasingly technologically interconnected world. The photograph offers a unique opportunity to open a direct dialogue between two separate points in time. I’m interested in exploring how this can be used to show viewers what may have been a fraction of a second in the life of a stranger can reveal something about the world around them.

www.mustafahabdulaziz.com

When and how did you become interested in Photography?

I came across a book by a master photographer in a bookstore while attending college for journalism in Allentown, Pennsylvania around late 2004. The book, “In The American West”, brought me face to face with people who wore their stories in the lines of their clothing and their lives in the lines of their eyes.

There was, of course, other points where I saw and was interested in photography, but seeing Avedon’s opus, a saga of hard lives in the forgotten west rendered me fixated: the photographs bypassed the head and went straight to the soul.

What gear do you mainly shoot with?

Canon film and digital cameras, now learning medium format on a Mamiya 7. Prime lens’ because I can never decide.

What is your #1 source of inspiration?

I’ve been inspired by many things, mostly music and film. I’m really interested in telling stories that transport the viewer to another place if only for a moment. The photographers in MJR, the photo collective I belong to, continue to challenge and inspire me. Other young photographers like Justin Maxon, Dominic Nahr and Matt Eich remain inspirational in different ways.

Many times photographers find themselves with a full schedule of paying gigs, and end up with little time for doing the work they truly love. Do you struggle with finding time for your personal work?

Making a living is important, of course, but there is something about photography, particularly documentary photography, in the way it demands you experience life in unique ways. As a freelance photographer, time is often a luxury that fluctuates radically. These days I find much of my free time is spent on the back end of making pictures. Why do I point my camera at this and not that? How can I improve myself as a person so I can be open to my subject matter while thinking critically about what I’m photographing and my own process? Money is a tool; it can be earned and given or taken away. My bank balance only determines what I am capable of physically achieving, not how much I can grow intellectually. If photographs are partially a reflection of the person who creates them, then I am continually on a personal journey towards the golden ratio: towards improving myself and not necessarily my pictures. If I can succeed, I am sure my pictures will follow.

What is your all time favorite genre to shoot (portraiture, conceptual, commercial, etc..)?

Documentary. I find I’m most excited and engaged when interacting with a reality I cannot control. Too slow? Try again. And when that image comes out and your elements are just nearly perfect, don’t settle. Do it better next time.

Do you have any upcoming exhibits you would like our readers to know about?

Nueva Luz, a publication put out by En Foco, is doing a feature by Danielle Jackson, head of exhibitions and cultural projects at Magnum Photos (NY) on my work from Patagonia for the Spring 2010 issue.

MJR just put on a show on January 21 in New York City called Make-Do that found us collaborating with another talented group of photographers called Luceo Images (www.luceoimages.com). We produced a fine-art magazine and had the pages blown-up large and displayed on the gallery walls at Gallery CPW near Central Park West.

What is one thing that makes your work unique>?

I’m not sure. A friend who is a really amazing photographer once told me can create a mood of drama in my pictures, which is something I struggle with. I’m not a subtle person, or photographer.

if you could photograph anyone, dead or alive, who would it be and why?

I recently read The Autobiography of Malcolm X by Alex Haley. He’s a man who used to sell drugs up on 52nd Street in New York City, part Scottish blood, who went on to move from the lower economic tiers of an oppressed part of the population to prison and into spiritual leadership. In those turbulent times, to see that life as it transforms through intimate photographs would undoubtedly produce historically defining visual documents. These types of works don’t happen often, but when they do their true meaning changes over time. I’m hoping I’ll be fortunate to witness one in my time.

what’s your dream photo field trip?

Any where the only batteries that work are in my camera.

what’s your post production photo process?

I severely underexpose in RAW and hope I don’t loose my entire image.

if you had unlimited resources to purchase any type of camera, what would it be?

I’m not much into cameras. I’d much rather spend the money on books, probably everything Trent Parke has ever published.

who are your favorite shooters and why

Christopher Anderson and Trent Parke from Magnum Photos, Jason Eskenazi and Luc Delahaye. Through their vision, they own their photographs.

what has been the shining moment of your career thus far?

When I got the call from The Wall Street Journal to go photograph Obama’s inauguration. It was really the first time of having to go into something really large and come back with something uniquely mine.

samples of Mustafah’s work:

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