After a few years away from Saudi Arabia, during which time she had her business and trading name more or less appropriated behind her back by a business partner, the Saudi photographer Samia El Moslimany is back in Jeddah and reestablishing herself. She has a new digital studio up and running and it is “business as usual” as photography by Samia. To let old and new clients know where she is now operating from, she is holding an “Open House” combined with an exhibition at her new studios just off Al Kayyal Street, which runs parallel to Prince Sultan Street where her previous studio was located. “I don't usually have exhibitions because basically what we do is we shoot and make portraits for people, as well as doing weddings and commercial shoots for particular clients. So as well as exhibiting some of that work, I am also going to be showing fine art images of Saudi Arabia, which will be for sale. They are mostly in color, and there are a few of Haj that are in black and white.” I asked Samia when she had had an opportunity to take her photos of Saudi Arabia. “I used to be a member of the Natural History Society and used to go on camping trips with them with my husband and kids. My husband was also really good about stopping when I wanted him to when we were on road trips. This is the type of photography that I really enjoy, more so than doing portraits of people. I would like to do more of this. The other thing that I would like to do is more work for publication – but it doesn't pay very well, as I am sure you know! I do some work for “Aramco World” and one of my commissions was to take photographs for a feature on the Haj entitled “Welcoming God's Guests”. This wasn't from the point of view of the pilgrims, but from the perspective of everyone who provides all the different services. So I actually took about two months to shoot this, and it was arduous but interesting. How I wish I had had a digital camera at the time because I shot about 12,000 images on film and I had the films processed here and they were all over processed – you can see from the prints here that there is a graininess about them. It broke my heart, and I had all the films processed at the same time. They were on transparencies where there is so little room for error. There was digital retouching at the time, and out of those 12,000 images they used 42 for the magazine.” She has found that being a female photographer has its advantages in Saudi Arabia. “A lot of doors open and people are more willing to help you because you are a woman, and not just in the wedding and family photography. I have done a lot of commercial photography and on many occasions have been one woman among up to fifty men. Because you are unique in that way, people are ready to support you, carry things, and assist you in what you are doing.” Samia El Moslimany is one of those fortunate people who knew from a very early age what career she wanted to pursue. She had always loved photography and at the tender age of seven, she came up against how sensitive this subject can be in Saudi Arabia. At the time she was at school in Jeddah. Prior to that, she and her siblings had been living in Seattle with their American mother and Egyptian father. He then decided that he wanted his children to be able to speak and write Arabic, so he moved the family to Jeddah and enrolled the children in Saudi schools. One day, Samia took a camera into school to photograph her friends. The Principal got to hear of the escapade and demanded that Samia hand over the camera – which she duly did, but even at seven years old, she was smart enough to take the film out first. “But”, she said, “only three or four of the photos came out! And I got into a lot of trouble – first for taking the photos, and then for taking the film out of the camera!” Samia met and married her Saudi husband in California. They came to live in Jeddah and she first started her photography here in 1986 as a wedding photographer. Her main “bread & butter” has since been as a social photographer, including portraits and family portraits, and also specialising in baby portraits. She has adopted a style similar to that of the renowned Australian baby photographer, Anne Geddes. “It is a market demand – people really like it. It is what the customer wants. But I don't always do what the customer wants because there is a lot of stuff with retouching that they want and I refuse to do. I am adamant about keeping a classic look to my photographs and so that they will stand the test of time. If I were to do the kind of things that they want me to do – special effects – just because it is popular at the time, they wouldn't like ten years down the road. It is one thing if you are photographing teenage girls for a fun portrait, but quite another when it is a wedding. I don't mind if it's the casual, more journalistic style, where people don't want to be posed, but we are there to stage manage the production and I don't want my brides to look back and think: ‘Oh no, why did I do that? How come I did my make up that way?'” As well as being highly qualified with a Masters Degree in Filmmaking, Samia ensures that she is up to date with the technical aspects of her craft and attends courses and workshops every year. Her studio is completely self-sufficient in that it has its own production labs – an important aspect in Saudi Arabia for women's privacy. She doesn't want her clients to leave with just a print in their hand; she wants them to leave with a fully mounted or framed portrait, and all this can be done in-house. She and her staff are adept at the various programs for manipulating digital images and she has also trained several photographers to the high standard that she demands. “We use Fuji S2, S3 and S5 cameras. They suit us very well because they are light and we can use the type of lenses to give us the flexibility that we need. We have started doing a lot of available light photography – that is photography without using flash – and even at ISO 1600, it is amazing how little grain there is on these images. The Fuji cameras also allow you to shoot in black and white and the results are better than if you change a colour picture to black and white using Photoshop.” Samia is holding her Open House and Exhibition on Tuesday 29th April from 5p.m., and on Wednesday 30th April all day until 11 p.m., for women only. For further details contact (02) 683 3245, or email [email protected] Photography by Samia is located on Hisham Al-Adwy Street, off Kayyal Street in the Rawdah District, Jeddah. __
