Lena Prieto

I am photographer and video producer. Also a former sociologist with experience in research and project management.

I believe in justice, activism and social change. And I think that photo documentary is a great tool to defend these values nowadays. I focus in the deep look of storytelling beyond the scoop photo. Because only through the understanding of other perspectives by living close to complex situations, one is actually able to transmit with honesty what is happening, so awareness can be truly raised in the public.

I have lived with the Palestinian refugees in Lebanon, befriended transgender persons in Hawaii, interacted with Las Vegas and Denver homeless people and visited the Rroma communities in Romania. More recently I have gotten involved in a project with child monks in Nepal. These children move from their Himalayan villages to the Kathmandu Valley monasteries in search of a better life.

I think that my identification with the uprooted people is because I have been uprooted myself. Voluntarily, yes, but uprooted nevertheless. I feel that I was a privileged person by reason of my birthplace and because of this I had choices. And because of that, I have a certain responsibility to give a voice to those who had no options and no choices; and I can do it through what I am passionate about, to take pictures.

I love to cross visible walls and invisible borders. I believe in the close look and time shared with the people I talk about. I enter in their shelters, in their houses, in their daily dramas and happy moments. Somehow, also in their lives and learn from their experiences and their perception of the world.