"I am intrigued with both the unfamiliar and the ordinary. For the past four years, I have traveled throughout Italy, Eastern Europe, Kenya and Ghana. Much of my work focuses on new ways of depicting foreign places. Just as the Impressionists sought to remold the idea of the Realists’ painting into abstract images, I strive to redefine the documentary photograph. While capturing the feeling of a moment, I also place my individual mark on each image.

In 2006, I traveled to Kenya to work on a reforestation project. For one month I lived with a family in a farming community at the foot of Mt. Kenya, where I discovered a completely different standard of living. I am working to develop the Kenya project and expand on the concept of travel photography; and, at the same time, redefine the role of the photographer in a foreign place. I worked again in Africa when, in the Fall of 2006, Women in Progress, a women’s empowerment organization in Ghana, invited me work with them as photographer. I would like to rework standard ideas of photography to produce alternative documentation of a people and their culture. My focus is on workers, farmers, families and other emblems that compose the everyday. As a guest in another country, I remain an outsider looking in, but my goal is to break through the line between foreign traveler and inquisitive visitor, conveying my experiences visually.

Another objective is to make the imperfect appear beautiful. Anticipated accidents develop into a means for creative solutions. A pallid sky becomes a chemical explosion. Moments of clarity stream into hazy borders. Tree branches form drooping silhouettes, veins on a white, cloudy canvas. Seen through the lens, the subject changes into a matter of extremes. Black defines dark, highlights bellow from expanses of grey, and lines dart chaotically amidst altered spaces. I anticipate the imperfect and thus manipulate it with dramatic and often unpredictable results.

My goal is to act a conduit for creative and cultural communication between societies in an attempt to move toward a more progressive, open-minded arena that is open to change and new ideas. I strive to use my passion as an artist to raise awareness and foster a mutual understanding between communities on an international level. I intend to do this by working as a creative partner with non-profits, ethically-minded for-profits, media outlets, educational institutions and various exhibition venues."
 Julia Blaukopf 
website: www.JuliaBlaukopf.com