A New Generation of Photographers

Photography is inarguably an ever-changing landscape. The visual art created by a photographer and their camera gives the viewer a truly unique opportunity to genuinely look through another person’s eyes, to see what they see in a given moment. While we may have our personal favorites, we can only benefit from taking a look at the works of artists we may not be familiar with.

Below, you’ll find 10 supremely talented women who are making sure you remember their names as contemporary photographers. Whether it’s portraiture, fashion, documentary-style or conceptual, the various styles of visual art shown by this diverse group of women are compelling, mystifying, truthful and raw. These visual storytellers and inspiring minds are skilled crafters that you should absolutely be taking the time to follow.

Scroll through the sample images and do yourself a favor by checking out their Instagram pages or personal portfolio sites.

Lydia Hudgens is a Brooklyn-based fashion portrait photographer with a passion for highlighting the strengths and personalities of her subjects. From commercial projects to editorial work, she has predominantly focused on plus-size fashion, dedicating her practice to the celebration and beauty of diverse bodies.

Hudgens grew up in the San Francisco bay area and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in fine art photography from the Academy of Art University. Her passion for the intentional nature of film has driven her recent works as she has returned to the analog process.

Hudgen’s works have been featured in Vogue, Teen Vogue, Instyle Magazine, Glamour Magazine, and more.

IG – @lydiahudgens

Site – lydiahudgens.com/

Audrie Storme is a creator at heart. With a zest for life, a thirst for adventure, a passion for visual storytelling, and a deep love of coffee, her images embody a nostalgic quality and an analog aesthetic that simultaneously screams ‘Southern California’ and ‘Modern Vintage.’

Her documentation of the world around her continues through a selection of blog posts on her personal page. From smartphone snaps to the first DSLR, to mirrorless and then on to 35mm film, her creative journey is a blast to follow and without a doubt, familiar to many.

IG – @audriestorme

Site – audriestorme.com

After a successful career as an internationally-traveling professional dancer, Djeneba Aduayom progressed into photography and brought her love of movement and emotive performance into her imagery and subsequent directing work.

Drawing inspiration from her cultural mix of French, Italian, and African heritage, her concepts and artistic expression is rooted in her personal exploration of the inner worlds that reside in her imagination. In looking within and articulating her creative ideas in a visual abstraction that beckons interpretation, she hopes her works allow the outside viewer to travel to a universe of their very own making. 

IG – @djeneba.aduayom

Site – djeneba-aduayom.com

A Durham, North Carolina native by way of Dallas Texas, Kennedi Carter is a photographer with a primary focus on Black subjects. Her work highlights the aesthetics & sociopolitical aspects of Black life as well as the overlooked beauties of the Black experience: skin, texture, trauma, peace, love and community. Her work aims to reinvent notions of creativity and confidence in the realm of Blackness.

Her work has been featured in British Vogue, GQ, Vanity Fair, The Fader, Essence, The New York Times, Men’s Health, and TIME.

IG – @internetbby

Site – candacegelman.com/kennedi-carter-overview

Czech-born Marie Tomanova grew up in Mikulov, a South Moravian border town. After receiving a painting MFA she left to the United States. Turning to photography, displacement, identity, gender, and memory became key themes in her work.

With an ongoing series of self-portraits that address the sense of displacement and finding her place in the American landscape, and several other deeply personal projects shown at various exhibitions, Tomanova carves out a path that is unafraid yet anxious, bold yet vulnerable, and decidedly unique.

IG – @marietomanova

Site – marietomanova.com

Lauren Withrow was raised in a small farming town in Texas. This landscape in which she grew up inspired her focus on interpersonal relationships and the struggles of emotional connections. She currently lives and works between Los Angeles, CA and Dallas, Texas.

Selected clients include Sony Music, New York Times, W Magazine, Legacy Recordings, Teen Vogue, Dead Oceans, Secretly Group, The Guardian UK, and Neiman Marcus.

IG – @laurenwithrow

Site – laurenwithrow.com

Conceptual, fine art photographer, Lindsey Ross has early memories of making photographs, which include enlarging poster-sized images in the basement darkroom with her father. She has been most influenced by photographers such as Marcia Resnick and Francesca Woodman.

Becoming interested in the wet plate collodion process when she viewed a collection of early 20th century prisoner mug shots, Ross began working with the format in 2010.  Wet plate collodion process has become the ideal format for Ross, who seeks both autonomy and a sense of connection.  Ross finds freedom in taking raw materials and transforming those into photographs.  The slow pace of collodion requires a presence and intimacy that connects her to both the physical and spiritual world.

IG – @thealchemistress

Site – lindseyrossphoto.com

Joyce NG is a London-based fashion photographer who spent her youth in the multitude of sprawling malls throughout the city of Hong Kong, during the handover era.

In her images, she constructs a play between reality and built environments, making subtle reference to the vast array of product merchandising she grew up with. As a mallrat, her visual language was formed strictly from the saturation of advertisements, Cantopop and “Mo lei tau”, a nonsensical humour unique to Hong Kong culture.

IG – @joyceszeng

Site – maanifest-agency.com/joyce-ng

Nicky Quamina-Woo is a Black + indigenous Hawaiian visual storyteller, dividing her time between the African continent, Southeast Asia, and New York City.

Woo’s work focuses on human unrest and social justice with projects that center on the complicated realities that frame those events, particularly as precipitated by the legacy of western colonization. She is deeply interested in the aftermath of collective trauma and the myriad ways it shifts the underlying ethos of groups to form something new. Adaptation as a means of survival, with morphology that becomes integrated and syncretized with cultures over time. Nicky’s desire to examine these changes is intrinsically linked to her ethnic heritage, whose parallels inspire her to dig deeper in search of human fortitude and solace.

In her time as an independent, her clients have included The New York Times, Bloomberg, The Washington Post, CNN, Human Rights Watch, Facebook, Der Spiegel, Apple, the Melinda Gates Foundation, Reporters Beyond Borders, The Guardian, Vogue Italia, and Marie Claire magazines. 

IG – @nickywoophoto

Site – nickywoo.com

Shingi Rice is a London-based, self-taught photographer of Spanish/British – Zimbabwean origin.

Due to the lack of real representation and cultural identification she has experienced in her surroundings, she decided to focus on creating beautiful imagery with people of colour – especially black women, LGBTQ community, plus-size models, individuals with disabilities, and mature models.

IG – @bluespit

Site – bluespit.net