When Jason Rezaian first started traveling from the Bay Area to Iran as a freelance journalist more than 20 years ago, he quickly realized his stories needed “good, powerful photos because I was writing about a country most Americans had written off as a place you couldn’t see and couldn’t possibly know.”

Fortunately, he soon connected with Iranian photojournalist Yalda Maoiery whose stirring images highlighted the complexities and contradictions of contemporary life in Iran, especially for women. The two storytellers collaborated on a blog and then an ambitious 2007 story for the Chronicle. Rezaian recently recalled it being “one of the first pieces in a major American newspaper to frame Iran as a destination” for travel, during a period of heavy sanctions and enmity between the two nations. Maoiery’s expressive images show women window shopping and eating ice cream by the Caspian Sea, as well as discordant billboards advertising middle-class conveniences alongside hardline propaganda.

Both journalists’ careers soared, and both experienced the Iranian regime at its most repressive. 

Rezaian, now a Washington Post reporter and CNN contributor, was famously arrested in 2014 on false espionage charges while living and working in Tehran and imprisoned for 18 months. Maoiery became one of her country’s preeminent documentarians, and her images were repeatedly deemed a threat. She was imprisoned six times, most recently on the first day of the protests that erupted in 2022 following the death of young Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini. Following a suspended sentence, Maoiery remained in legal jeopardy. She fled to the U.S. last fall to receive the prestigious Wallis Annenberg Justice for Women Journalists Award in person at the home of Jeff Bezos, former founder and CEO of Amazon and owner of the Washington Post. She now lives with her parents in South San Francisco.

Maoiery’s first solo exhibition, the powerful retrospective “Standing in the Dust: Photography of Yalda Maoiery,” tells the story of Iranian women’s resistance and her undying commitment to “giving the women of Iran a face and a voice,” she explained. It is on view at the Sausalito Center for the Arts through July 28.

“Yalda became a collaborator, friend and confidant,” Rezaian told the Chronicle from Washington, D.C. “She’s shown incredible courage in taking some of the most iconic recent images of Iran.”

Maoiery spoke with the Chronicle about her Sausalito show being a “dream come true.” 

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Q: You were arrested and imprisoned for the first time almost 20 years ago for taking photos of a student protest in Tehran. What gave you the courage to keep working, knowing it would likely lead to more retaliation?

A: I don’t want to say that I’m a very brave person, but in Iran, when I started my career, I was one of only two or three women working as photojournalists. It was really a man’s job. The society is very religious and conservative, so they couldn’t understand if you were a woman and carrying a camera when you should be carrying a baby.

The first time (I was arrested) it was in front of Tehran University on the anniversary of the student protests. I had my camera but I didn’t take any pictures. I asked them, “Please, go develop the film and you’ll understand I didn’t do anything.” But it took them 22 days with me in a solitary cell for them to figure it out.

Q: Other than arrest, what obstacles did you face as a female photojournalist in Iran?

A: It’s hard for people here to believe, but when a job involved (photographing) a meeting or an official event, you couldn’t enter because you were a woman. And if I was working with a news agency, their invitation would state, “Please send a male photographer. Do not send a woman.” 

Q: After covering numerous wars and natural disasters, do you remember deciding it was most important to focus your attention on Iranian women?

A: I remember coming back after being in Lebanon for the 33-day war with Israel (in 2006) and realizing I was taking a lot of photos of women almost by accident. I had so much in common with the women in my photos. We’ve always been the second gender in Iran. We don’t have many rights and the list of the issues is long, from a smaller number of university jobs to having the right to keep babies after divorce. Iranian women have been trying to break free of these rules for 40 years. For the last 20 I’ve been working, I felt I had to be their voice.

Q: Did something feel different about the protests following Mahsa Amini’s death?

A: This time was completely different. I saw many girls very sure about what they wanted. They had a new kind of courage, shouting, ready to fight with the police officers. They are not as patient as my generation was because they know what happened before with calm, patient protests: nothing.

Q: You spoke out publicly after Donald Trump tweeted a photo of yours without your permission, and you’ve since said his recklessness changed your life. How?

A: I took that picture inside the university and gave it to the wires without my name. After three months, I published an announcement that it’s my picture. Nothing happened until one year later when President Donald Trump tweeted the picture on the anniversary of the Islam Republic, and they were very angry about it. I was interrogated for a year and sentenced to two years in jail. In my opinion, it wasn’t about my picture. It was about why Donald Trump used it.

Iran was under very strict sanctions. With the travel ban, my brother and I couldn’t get a visa to see our parents who were here. I was a victim of Donald Trump’s policy. And my photo was suddenly everywhere. I couldn’t stop him.

Q: Is it empowering to include the image now in your Sausalito exhibition?

A: Oh, yes, we have a big print of that one.

Q: You’ve covered so many important moments in Iran over the last two decades. How does it feel to show the breadth of your work in an exhibition for the first time?

A: I had an exhibition in Tehran 20 years ago, but it was only about the Afghanistan war. This is my first time showing my photos of women’s issues in Iran and I’m very excited. I couldn’t have this exhibition in my country because just doing my job there is a crime. So this is a kind of freedom of speech for me. 

Q: What do you hope people learn from your images?

A: It’s been my concern that the story of Iran has completely disappeared from the media. I know that there’s a war in Palestine, and in Ukraine, but there’s been a war in Iran being fought by Iranian women every day these past 40 years and people should know about it. By going to school, going to university, not wearing the hijab, they’ve been fighting every day.

Jessica Zack is a freelance writer.

Wildscreen ARK, the UK’s newest biodiversity content hub, has teamed up with the West of England Mayoral Combined Authority to invite young people in the West of England to tell their stories about nature in their neighbourhood through short films and photos.

Running from 10^th May to 31^st August, they’re calling on young people aged 13 –18 to make and enter short films and photos about local nature for the chance to win either a family winter lights trip to Bluestone National Park Resort (for age category 13 – 15) or a Canon R100 camera and lens from London Camera Exchange (age category 16 – 18).

Throughout their outreach, the Wildscreen ARK team has found that although young people do appreciate, care about and take photos or videos of the nature around them, they don’t often share their experience – and ARK want to change that with Wild West.

To further level the playing field for the competition, only entries taken on smartphones are allowed – making the competition accessible for the majority of young people. 

Every entry needs to have one species identified within it, as shortlisted entries will have the fantastic opportunity of having their work displayed on Wildscreen ARK’s nature education hub. Shortlisted entries will also be displayed publicly at Wildscreen Festival 2024 in October and locally to entrants in the West of England.

For more information including full Terms of Entry, FAQ and links to supporting learning resources visit Wildscreen ARK.

Scratch up on your photography skills

Alí Marín, Mexico, Carnival Night, Tlacotalpan, Veracruz

Adults, young people and children enjoy the nighttime carnival parade, one of the most anticipated celebrations, to the rhythm of salsa, reggaeton and current hits. Queens, kings, princesses, and princes parade through the main streets of the town to be cheered and accompanied by the community. Like the rest of Latin America and countries around the world where the Catholic religion predominates, Carnival is the festival that precedes Lent

Local photographer Terrance Haanen will show his beautiful photography here in our Portal Gallery at the Fuller Lodge Art Center. Terrance often photographs our beautiful landscapes in New Mexico in dynamic ways, giving new perspective to our familiar atmosphere here in the Southwest. The exhibit will run from July 12 to July 25. Stop by the opening reception Friday from 5 p.m. to meet Terrance and have some refreshments. For more information, go to https://terrance-haanen.pixels.com/

The idea of “home” and what it is to each of us is an intriguing concept. Several years ago, Magnum Photos put together a collection of images where their photographers described the idea through their art. It’s a very personal concept and, therefore, involves so many different backgrounds and emotional experiences. “It’s an ode and a love letter to my home of Hawaii and to all those who came before us and will come after us as Kanaka Maoli, the indigenous people of Hawai’i,” says photographer Mainei Kinimaka to the Phoblographer when speaking to us about her project. All shot using a Leica SL3, the photographs remind us that identity is often a major part of the photography we create.

This article is presented in partnership with Leica. All images by Mainei Kinimaka. Used with permission. All photographs shot on the Leica SL3. Please take a look at her Instagram @maineikinimaka and her Leica Profile here.

Luckily for Mainei, she got into photography when she was around 11 years old thanks to her uncle’s penchant for capturing moments. He used to take photographs of surfers on the beach with an old camera. Like so many others over there, Mainei used to go surfing every day. “I must have bugged him to use it enough times, because when he moved onto a new camera, he gifted me his old one,” she tells us. It’s through this perfect mixture of coffee and cream that Mainei went on to make the radiant images she does.

One could also say that he also gifted her his love of the art form and understanding of how a camera can make us closer to the moments in front of us.

Growing up in her part of Hawaii, you couldn’t just walk a few blocks to your local Radio Shack or Camera Shop. But that didn’t matter — because she turned water into wine by using her camera and deep emotional connections to what was around her. Blessed with the gift of photography, she focused more on making simple images and being as natural as she could possibly get. Much of her work revolved around those close to her.

Mainei also learned about how incredibly timeless photographs can be — and has channeled this into her work. The image of her father above is a testament to that. “When I think of black and white, I’m thinking of a story over the color,” she explains. But there’s so much more to this image that we don’t realize.

In that image, my dad is leaning over his canoe, with his back facing the camera. The paddle in the image was handed down to him by his elder brother who taught him to surf and to steer the canoe. The back bone is representative of our ancestors in Hawai’i. This image felt like it could transcend generations, and it felt like black and white was necessary for it. 

Mainei Kinimaka

Still, photography often has this power much more than natural video with ambient sound. Images allow us to ponder and contemplate a specific moment rather than processing tons of small moments together. Even though Mainei is also a filmmaker, she still understands the power of a still photo.

To make her photographs, Mainei kept things pretty simple. “I’m a terrible online shopper,” she jokes. Because of this, she sticks with what she’s got on hand. For the past 5 years, she’s shot on Leica cameras. Currently, she’s making her masterpieces with the Leica SL3, Leica SL 24-90mm f/2.8-4 Vario-Elmarit ASPH, Leica APO-Summicron-SL 75mm f/2 ASPH. Lens, and Leica APO-Summicron-SL 90mm f/2 ASPH. Lens. The lenses help her be as versatile as she can as she often isn’t even sure what she’s going to end up photographing.

Mainei is surrounded by large amounts of natural beauty that many of us could only dream of. So it comes without saying that everything around her just looks perfect in her eyes. Because it’s Hawaii, there are lots of different situations that the island might give her. Sometimes it’s rain, mist, intense sun, etc. The Leica SL3, with its IP durability rating, makes it great for standing up to the elements better than the vast majority of cameras on the market.

“Their cameras and lenses have definitely aided me in my quest for ‘the natural,’” Mainei explains to us. “The way their systems are so refined, and the way their lenses (especially their vintage lenses and the glass on those lenses) are crafted, definitely lends a certain soul to your imagery that I don’t think is replicable.”

In fact, Mainei doesn’t even do much post-production. And to that end, she’s been mostly removed from everything going on right now with Generative AI and photography. “…I have more of a draw toward the natural environment. Therefore, AI tends to sound like the last thing I’d personally explore.”