Butterflies and Caterpillars

January 31, 2022

The body of work takes a closely intimate look at the contemporary drag scene in the United States. It’s a photographic examination that looks at the notions of identity and how we construct the self in a space different from society’s pre-established gender-specific roles and expectations.

Recent Stories

I want it all to go back to the way it was before
Pippa Healy is a photographer, artist and printmaker based in London. Her raw, diaristic practice responds to events that have occurred in her life, therefore it has a unique sense of authenticity. Healy’s work references loss, grief, longing and violence and it’s rather difficult to pigeonhole as every
Pippa Healy
NachtClubsBerlin
This project documents today’s techno culture in Berlin, and shows how it has been transformed into a mainstream culture that attracts millions of tourists to the city each year.
Sabrina Jeblaoui
"The situation is fucked up, but people are fucking great!"
Kharkiv, Ukraine on the first day of Russian invasion
Pavel Dorogoy
End of Olympics
The biggest sports event on the planet turns into a mixture of political and public health disputes, yet not covered enough by the established media
Johan Brooks
Casitas
The project exposes the living conditions that Puerto Ricans have to endure such as natural catastrophes, limited government support and unstable electric service. Although the series began in 2013, it wasn’t until 2017 when Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico that Saldaña realised the series is something more than just a personal project — it is a testament of the residence of the local population.
Annie Y Saldana
London '82
Sunil Gupta enrolled at the prestigious Royal College of Art in London in the early 1980s. Having access to colour negative printing at the college, the young photographer began to roam the streets of the Big Smoke searching for the epicentres of queer life — Earl’s Court, King’s Road,
Sunil Gupta
Azerbajiani Stories
In Azerbaijani Stories the photographer Onur Tatar had created what he calls composite portraits. These are the stories of ten people from Azerbaijan combined with their portraits and images of places of significance. As Tatar says, topography, or the arrangement of both natural and artificial physical features of an area,
Onur Tatar
After The Fall
After the Fall is a body of work by Stewart Weir documenting the fall of the Taliban when the city of Herat was taken over by the Northern Alliance. The images were taken almost 20 years ago, in 2002, shortly after the Twin Towers in the US fell on September
Stewart Weir
Beach Boulevard
Brian O’Neill is an Illinois-based sociologist and photographer whose work looks at the human condition and society’s relationship to nature. He investigates the various meanings of “industry” and how it affects local communities and environments. Beach Boulevard, his first photographic publication, is a small spiral-bound book in a small edition of 100. Rather than probing the typical documentary question “what’s going on here” it delves deeper and wonders how we actually got to our current sta
Brian O'Neil
Fire Corps
The concept (and practice) of voluntary work brings out the best of people. Volunteers not only don’t get paid, they also give their time, passion and effort to a cause that they believe is worth fighting for. Johan Brooks presents us with the story of the Fire Corps — groups
Johan Brooks

mnngful Originals

mnngful Members

Stephen Leslie
UK
,

Film director, screenwriter and photographer based in London "About 20 years ago I started to take photographs with a small point and shoot camera. What began as a simple way to keep visually alert in between directing jobs soon morphed in to a daily diary of images and eventually became an obsession I've been struggling to contain ever since."

Max J
CY
,
Limassol

Documentary and street photographer from Cyprus. Founder of mnngful, The Phooks. Author of TheIslandArchive.com.

Roxana Alison
UK
,
Manchester

Mexican-British photographer based in the United Kingdom with a socially driven focus whose work explores themes of place, belonging and identity. The personal experience is often my departure point to explore universal issues concerned with the human condition. Roxana has worked in the fields of photography and education for the past fifteen years and have extensive experience working with young people and underrepresented communities.

Joanne Coats
UK
,
Dales

Documentary photographer based in the North of England. She is interested in modes of production, rurality, and class inequality. Her practice is as much about process, participation and working with communities as photography. Coates’ key themes are Northern culture in rural places and working-class life. In 2020 she was commissioned as Artist in Residence at Berwick Visual Arts. In 2021 she was commissioned as an artist working on the Tees-Swale project looking at social justice and the rural, she was also a winner of the Jerwood /Photoworks award. Joanne’s work has been exhibited both in the UK and internationally in venues including The Royal Albert Hall, Reveal-T Photography Festival, Cork Photo Festival and Somerset House. In 2012 during her Foundation year she was awarded a Metro Imaging Portfolio Prize, a Magnum Portfolio Review and The Ideastap innovators award. Upon graduation, she was awarded Magenta Flash Forward Top 30 emerging talent in the UK, 2016. Joanne was one of the artists working in Hull, for the UK City of Culture in 2017. She was one of the 209 female photographers to photograph MPs for the centenary of the vote. She is a member of Women Photograph. A co-founder of Form Collective.

Conrado Velasco
IE
,
Kilkenny

Photographer and Art Director born and educated in Manila, Philippines. Presently divides time between Kilkenny, Ireland & Berlin, Germany.

Francesca Cao
IT
,
Milano

Francesca Cao has been published and exposed in Europe and United States. In her personal work constantly looks for new ways of telling stories to stimulate the aesthetic reflection on photography, and emotionally move the viewer. Her first book Temporary Life is published by Postcart in 2020.

Rik Moran
US
,

Callum O'Keefe
UK
,
Bristol

Documentary photographer focused on the relation between people and place. Building the base of my portfolio on live music, he has recently graduated with a First Class Honours in Photography from The University West of England.

Edwin Ndeke
KE
,
Nairobi

Humanitarian, portrait and documentary photographer based in Kibera, Nairobi "My work focuses on socio-economic, cultural, political and environmental issues depicting a wider spectrum of life."

Lewis Bush
UK
,

Photographer, educator and curator working across media and platforms to visualise the activities of powerful organisations, practices, and technologies. Since 2012 his practice has explored issues ranging from the aggressive redevelopment of London, to the systemic inequalities of the art world. Recent works include Shadows of the State, which examines the democratic deficit of intelligence gathering, and Wv.B which examines the dark histories of space exploration. He is currently working on a long-term project about computer vision which runs in parallel with an ESRC funded PhD at the London School of Economics. He is also course leader of the MA Photojournalism and Documentary Photography (online) course at London College of Communication.

John Angerson
UK
,

Documentary and portraiture photographer, based in London He started his career in the early 1990s, covering the fall of the Berlin Wall and the changing geopolitical landscape of Eastern Europe. Since then, his work has continued to explore the different languages of documentary photography, focusing on how specific communities form, shift and develop. His projects have garnered critical acclaim and have been exhibited at major art institutions in the UK and overseas.

Melanie King
UK
,
Ramsgate

Multi-Disciplinary Artist. Co-Director of super/collider, Lumen Studios and founder of the London Alternative Photography Collective. Melanie is Lecturer In Photography at Canterbury Christ Church University, and a practice-based PhD Candidate at the Royal College of Art. She is represented by the Land Art Agency. To purchase original prints, you can visit the Land Art Agency and Argentea Gallery websites. Books are available via the website store, and monthly limited edition postcards are available on Patreon.

Stuart Freedman
UK
,

Commercial, editorial and travel photographer based between New Delhi and London working worldwide on a range of consumer brands with/without art direction.

Elena Kalyuzhnaya
RU
,
St. Petersburg

Documentary photographer based in Saint-Petersburg, Russia. Student of Academy of documentary photography “Fotografika” in Saint-Petersburg. Originally from a small town in the south of Russia, Elena appreciates the authenticity of the rural area and its traditions. The human place in society, PTSD emotions, and life in post-war and problematic regions are the main topics of her work. Elena’s work was published in Dodho Magazine, Takie Dela, Republic, and Regnum publishing. Elena is a silver prizer of Budapest international Contest 2020 in the student category. Also, her work was a part of the Ariano Film festival.

Floriana Avellino
IT
,

Stories worth seeing

mnngful is a platform supporting independent documentary photography & photojournalism.

Thanks to passionate storytellers, we learn about matters that otherwise stay neglected. Stories that matter, but have not been covered enough are captured and told by passion-driven photographers and journalists.

They create because they care about the world they live in and tell us about matters beyond our eyesight.Their work is often driven by pure enthusiasm, fuelled by own beliefs and dreams for a better world. That's why such independent work is worth special attention.

mnngful is here to support the meaningful stories they tell.

Read more