from the series The Encounters, 2007-2008
© MOHAMMADREZA MIRZAEI

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MOHAMMADREZA MIRZAEI is an Iranian photographer who lives and works in Tehran. His photos have been featured in multiple solo and group exhibitions at Dubai’s The Empty Quarter Gallery, London’s Mall Galleries and Silk Road Gallery in Tehran, among other galleries. MIRZAEI has been active as critic and translator of photographic texts for Iranian media and he was also founder and editor of Dide Magazine, an online magazine dedicated to contemporary Iranian photography.

The Encounters (2007-2008) consists of a series of images of tourists taking pictures. Setting up his camera from a high vantage point, these moments are frozen and reduced into graphical elements. Combining the minute detail of photography and fascination with the world of appearances, his work shifts between the familiar realm of documentary realism and the surreal.

What is a camera? “why do people take photographs?” I am always brought back to this very basic question when I take photographs or think about photography. – DAIDO MORIYAMA

And good news: his work will be on view at the Biel/Bienne Festival of Photography  from 7 September to 30 September 2012 in Biel, Switzerland (more info here).