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Featured Member Banafsheh Ehtemam
"True artists are my subjects, I just photograph them."
links to Banefsheh's work:
Around the World
An ear to the ground !
Not many photographers have faced sleepless nights in a car in the bitter cold of Alaska and seas of 30 feet just to take a photograph. Very few may have experienced the torturous cold winds on the borders of Iran and Iraq. Or say, climbing Mt. McKinley almost to death... And what about a two months journey climbing the Andes and sharing food with an Amazonian tribe? Banafsheh Ehtemam has dared and succeeded...
She was born in Tehran, Iran. As a child, she took many trips with her parents. It was the simple lifestyles and cultures of people in remote areas and the fantastic nature that surrounded them that she found herself most fascinated with. Governmental and societal upheaval, and the darkness that followed in her beloved land, caused her to leave Iran at the age of fifteen.
Having lived and studied in Europe for several years, she moved to the US to continue her education. School brought the discovery of the genius of Ansel Adams and Richard Avedon. Shortly thereafter, she received her first 35mm camera: a Mamiya ZM. And her love affair with photography began. "I love what I do. I find my work to be both satisfying and challenging. Choosing photography was my only way to capture the constant changing moments. I'm always searching... Perhaps, I am more of an explorer than an artist. 
I believe the best artists are the elements. They are continually working, coloring, transforming and shaping themselves and us. These elements can be real or surreal. As a documentary photographer, I like to experiment with both of these themes in my work. I like visual luminosity and also a spiritual quality in my images. Henry Bresson once said, "The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend." Through these journeys of the physical and the spiritual, she is helped by the four languages she speaks and the panache to travel through the world as a one-woman crew.
Banafsheh is a documentary / fine-art freelance photographer. Her images have been exhibited in galleries in Ma, NYC, Ca, NM, Paris, Belgium, London and The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.
http://www.bostonmagazine.com/blogs/boston/2007/10/23/questions-for-banafsheh-ehtemam/
http://bostonphotographycenter.com/search_user.php?search_user=Banafsheh+Ehtemam