Each year, Hasselblad, the world-renowned camera brand celebrates incredible female photographers with Hasselblad Heroines which casts a spotlight on talented creators from around the world.
The company has been doing this for the last few years shining a light on skilled female photographers as they make their mark on the world.
This year is no different. So we're showing off some of our favourites from now and previous entries for your enjoyment. Be sure to check out the official site and the Instagram hashtag to enjoy even more.
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Stephanie Blomkamp - photographer, editor and curator
Stephanie Blomkamp is a surreal photographer, editor and curator who often takes time to mentor others. Photography is a life-long passion for her and she's helping inspire others too.
Blomkamp also created Oath magazine which helps shine a light on photographers all over Africa. And she believes it's up to people like her to give women opportunities to get their work seen.
Lisa Devlin - wedding photographer
Lisa Devlin is a multi-talented photographer who previously worked as a music and celebrity photographer and now plies a trade as a wedding photographer.
Unlike a lot of other wedding photographers though, Devlin's work tells a story with a more natural and authentic style.
This Hasselblad Heroine runs an online school to help share her knowledge with other aspiring wedding photographers. She also hopes that the Hasselblad Heroine program will help enhance the visibility of women in the industry and encourage more women in future.
Lola Akinmade Akerstrom - travel photographer
Lola Akinmade Åkerström is both a travel photographer and award-winning storyteller who hails from Nigeria but now lives in Sweden.
As a Hasselblad Heroine, her mission is to make Black women more visible in the travel photography world:
"When it comes to professional travel photography, I am excited about and encouraged by the ever-growing wave of new women photographers, who are bringing fresh and dynamic eyes to their respective fields. My specific hope is to see more inclusion when it comes to the field of travel photography in particular, by supporting, spotlighting and uplifting more women of colour within the space."
Gigi Chung - architecture and urban photographer
Gigi Chung is an architecture and urban photographer who uses urban lines to create aesthetically pleasing photos.
Her photography has taken her around the globe and her work has appeared in both galleries and professional photography competitions.
As one of Hasselblad's Heroines she's a firm believer in equality in the photography industry:
"It’s important to advance awareness in public through education in women’s role in photography. Creating outlets and platforms to showcase women photographers’ works and increasing scholarships and grants to help women photographers to materialize new projects is also needed."
Anja Niemi - the fine artist
Anja Niemi is a fine art photographer who uses staged images to tell a visual story.
This highlighted image was chosen as part of the Hasselblad Heroines spotlight for the artist. It comes from a series of photos taken in 2018 called "She could have been a cowboy".
This selection of images gives a curious view of a fictional world where a female cowboy appears as the focus of the art yet never looks at the camera. Remaining aloof and mysterious in a truly curious way.
Isabella Tabacchi - the landscape photographer
Isabella Tabacchi is a landscape photographer who hails from Northern Italy. Her award-winning images have gained high praise and it's easy to see why.
Tabacchi says she "expresses her emotions through capturing the magic of the scenery she explores."
The result is a wonderful collection of visually astounding images where the artist has used leading lines, natural frames and foreground elements to craft incredible photographic views of our world.
Katerina Belkina - Hasselblad Master in Fine Art
Katerina Belkina is a Russian fine artist who crafts amazing works with both photography and digital painting.
She was previously nominated for the Kandinsky Prize and won the Hasselblad Masters Prize too.
Her work is a fascinating mix of self-portraits with various techniques employed to explore human emotion and tell a story through the medium of photography.
Alissa Ashley - portrait photographer
Alissa Ashley is a Los Angeles-based self-taught portrait photographer.
She tells an interesting story about her journey into photography:
"My interest in the arts began at a very young age beginning with drawing and gradually shifting to makeup after watching my mom apply hers every morning because I was so fascinated by the transformative element. Unbeknownst to me, that interest in makeup would lead me into a successful career on Youtube as a beauty influencer which I’ve been for the last 5 years. I am now at a stage in my career where I feel comfortable shifting my focus to another medium that I’ve always been in love with which is photography. I specialize in portrait photography, and also have a passion for macro & product photography.”
That interest in makeup has seemingly transferred nicely into photography where the composition of the shot helps to show off the beauty of the subject.
Flóra Borsi - the fine art photographer
Flóra Borsi is a Hungarian fine art photographer who uses clever photographic manipulation to create unusual and surreal portrait images.
Hasselblad Heroines explores more about that unusual touch:
"...Flora uses her own life, memories, and emotions to execute stunningly peculiar images featuring her as the main subject. Flóra plays with the relationship between body and self, reflects on the fragility of the human psyche and raises questions of female representation in art in her captivating creations."
Jillian Edelstein - portrait and documentary photographer
Jillian Edelstein is a South African photographer living in London who has well over 100 of her images in the National Portrait Gallery collection.
She started her photography career as a press photographer in Johannesburg, South Africa before later moving into portrait photography.
Her images have appeared in multiple international exhibits including the The Royal Academy, OXO Gallery in London, Sothebys, Les Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie in France and more.
Her work has also been featured in multiple publications including The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, The FT Weekend Magazine, Vanity Fair and many more besides.
Nina Welch-Kling - street photographer
On the streets of New York City, Nina Welch-Kling paints a very different picture with street photography who captures eye-catching views of people, buildings and her surroundings as she explores the city streets.
Her work makes fascinating use of light and shadows to create curious and visually pleasing photographs everyone can enjoy.
Andrea Zvadova - beauty and portrait photographer
Andrea Zvadova is another London-based photographer. Her work celebrates unusual beauty, diversity and uniqueness.
As you can imagine, that means a wide-range portfolio of some impressive portrait images of all manner of intriguing human beings.
Natalia Evelyn Bencicova - 2016's Hasselblad Master
Natalia Evelyn Bencicova is another Hasselblad Heroine with the ability to create some intriguing works of art.
She composes narrative-based images which blur the lines between reality and her imagination.
With washed-out colours, symbolic imagery and controlled composition she magics up some really interesting and eye-catching art. This even resulted in her becoming Hasselblad Master in 2016.
Bára Prášilová - conceptual photographer
Bára Prášilová is a surreal and conceptual photographer with an eye for the weird, absurdly humorous and slightly magical. She puts a lot of effort into her work, with custom props, costumes and a heck of a lot of planning.
The result of all this is a range of curious artworks that really raise an eyebrow or two. In 2014, she was named Hasselblad Master in the fashion and beauty category and it's easy to see why.
Chiara Zonca - fine art and landscape photographer
Chiara Zonca left London for the much less urban scenes of Vancouver to get closer to nature. She's taken that opportunity to create some magnificent landscape photography and brilliant works of art.
She takes inspiration from unpredictable areas of the landscape to create unusual views and fantastic photos too.
Julia Fullerton-Batten - fine art photographer
Julia Fullerton-Batten is a fine art photographer with more than a decade in the field. She's been involved in major projects and has received a number of prestigious awards, including becoming a Hasselblad Master in 2008.
Her work uses unusual locations, creative settings and covers controversial subjects with imagery that begs the user to look closer to and question what they're seeing.
Tina Signesdottir Hult - fine art photographer
Tina Signesdottir Hult is another Hasselblad Master who specialises in fine art, portraits and conceptual art.
She's self-taught and prides herself on never using a flash, but instead relying on natural lighting to get the best results.
Her portraits capture the fragility and vulnerability of the subject and their complexities too.
Maria Svarbova - portrait photographer
Maria Svarbova is a portrait photographer whose style departs from the norm and experiments with space, colour and atmosphere.
She describes her work with better words than we could:
"The atmosphere that’s depicted through a palette of pastel colors and overexposed tones transports the viewer into a sterilized world in which the characters have chosen to give up any kind of emotional extravagance that might unmask them. My photos are minimalistic but also futuristic."
Anna Devís - creative photographer
Anna Devís is a trained architect whose passion for creative photography has led to some interesting images that are a far cry from traditional architecture photography.
The resulting works feature an unmistakable style and boast plenty of fun too.
Karen Thomas - food and drink photographer
Karen Thomas has a talent for making you hungry with her work. Creating delicious food and drink photography for ad campaigns and more.
Like the other heroines on this list, Thomas hopes to see more women in the industry.
"...There are a lot of successful women food photographers that do editorial, packaging and POS but I’d say there are more men shooting food advertising than women. It would be good to level up here...My hope is that more women will break in to advertising so the balance is equal in all fields, and even more crucially I’d love to see more racial diversity."
Lydia Winters - the storyteller
Lydia Winters is known for being the first woman to join Mojang Studios (the creators of Minecraft) but she's also a creative photographer who uses her work to tell a story.
"I’ve always been a creative person and that has guided me through different career paths – elementary teacher, photographer, and my current 10 years within the video game industry...Photography and storytelling are intertwined for me. My mom has always said I have an eye for photography, which I realize can be interpreted as seeing a story."
Lydia has found a passion for product photography, particularly for photos of watches where she's drawn inspiration from nature, textures, feelings, and colours to create some very special images. You can see here work on Instagram where she posts as @lydiaswatches.
Aline Smithson - fine art photographer
Aline Smithson is a fine art photographer who works exclusively with film.
Over her career, she's seen women being represented more in the industry with "...more and more female curators and photo editors, and women photographers have been recognized with awards and exhibitions more than ever before."
Aline believes that female mentors are key to this trend continuing and women being fairly represented.
Aline's own techniques are fascinating. She specialises in fine art portraits and working one-on-one with her subjects:
"I always work alone—no assistant or hair and makeup artists. I find that making portraits is a collaborative process where the experience becomes a two-way gaze when both the subject and I reveal ourselves to each other." The results speak for themselves.