Karen Zusman

There’s no greater inspiration than social justice to learn a new skill quickly. I taught myself on the road, with tips from seasoned photojournalists I’d meet along the way. I returned to NYC in order to work as a freelance copywriter. In between gigs, I began visiting Cuba. I believe I came of age as a photographer on that beloved island, traveling to Cuba 21 times in 4 years, sometimes for months at a time. Diving in deep and forging relationships. Making intimate work that I hoped side-stepped the usual clichés.

Until the pandemic put a temporary end to my travel and I became involved with a BLM bicycle protest group in NYC; my latest work, The Super Power of Me Portrait Series, is a direct extension of both participating and documenting the movement in New York.

Now, 10 years in, I can see that I never left poetry. The formal rigor of crafting poems earlier in life ultimately taught me how to see. And as time passes, and I spend more of it behind the lens, I’m learning how photography brings me back to Buddhism, too. It’s given me a tangible way, away from the cushion, to explore  what it means to be human: to suffer, to question, to connect, or perhaps better said, photography has taught me a more universal way to love.

In 2021, I received the prestigious Leica Women’s Foto Project Award for my Super Power of Me Portrait Series.