Business History
I have been working as a storyteller for allof my adult life. I obtained a journalism graduate degree in 2004 fromConcordia University with the aim to be a print journalist. However, while Ilove writing and research, the journalism industry was quickly changing andmoving to an online platform. I then turned to documentary filmmaking which was a good fit for mecreatively. I worked for two years as a production assistant with a successfuldocumentary film production company in Montreal and then in 2008 I founded myown company, Safran Films Inc., and produced and directed my first feature TV documentary. Thatproject spanned 3 years of full time work during which time I single-handedly securednumerous Canadian and Quebec government arts grants amounting to $220,000,including a broadcast license with TV 5 Quebec.
The documentary that I made was called TaxiCasablanca and it was about the first female taxi driver in Casablanca,Morocco. Through making of this film I became aware of my life mission asan artist and journalist was to: “shed a light on dark corners, lend strength to quietvoices, and illuminate beauty.”
So many stories do notsee the light of day because they are overpowered by the louder moreconventional stories. And I soon recognized my goal as both an artist and ajournalist is to seek out these stories. The world is changed through storiesand grows and expands through what we give our attention to.
Upon completion of my first film Iquickly realized that there is little security in the documentaryindustry. Film projects depend oncompetitive grant applications and there are no guarantees. In 2008 Canada’s conservative governmentmade massive cuts to arts funding, forcing many documentary film companies toclose or be put on hold. As the years passed, I saw my dreams of supportingmyself through documentary film were dwindling and I decided to close mycompany and move to back the West coast where I was born and raised and exploreother avenues.
My love of storytelling has never gone away, I have simply found other mediumsof expression. In Vancouver, I continued to write for various publications andsupplemented my income through an airbnb rental I ran in my home. In 2016 I was applied and was acceptedto work as a CUSO volunteer in Kingston Jamaica where I continued to explorelittle known corners of the world and to tell the stories of the people I metthere. I completed threeplacements in Kingston over two years, working with inner city youth in one of the most dangerouscities in the world. The murderrate in Kingston is the 9th highest per capita in the world and thecountry is plagued with complex social problems. It was here that I decided tostart using the medium of photography to tell stories. For those two years Ideveloped an extensive portfolio, exploring themes such as teen pregnancy, andmusic-for-social-change organizations that help youth transcend the challengesof growing up in the inner city that is awash in guns, poverty and gangactivities. (https://www.maryfowles.com/documentary-photography)
Here I also broadened my scope artisticallyand became obsessed with streetphotography, riding for hours alone on the local busses grabbing shots of dynamicstreet scenes where I never could have walked with a camera (https://www.maryfowles.com/street_scroll).
Since then I have not looked back. I havecontinued to advance as a photographer through extensive self-study.
I have returned to Kingston three times since2018 on organized photography trips. On my last trip I coordinated a series ofartistic portraits of the youth I had worked with, all taken at the majesticKingston Waterfront. I hired youth I had previous worked with to help me asassistants and second photographers (https://www.maryfowles.com/waterfront). It is my dream to continue to involvethese youth in my business goals, and, once I have established a viablecommercial business in Vancouver, Canada, to expand to the Jamaica market,offering my services in the wedding and portrait photography industry inJamaica and providing youth with mentorship, skills training, equipment, andwork opportunities.
My focus for the time being is on theVancouver, Vancouver Island, and Gulf Island’s markets. The aim of my business is to draw frommy extensive history and expertise in storytelling towards a commercialpurpose, offering photography services to paying customers and fulfilling forthem a variety of traditional photographic needs, such as weddings,portraiture, and event photography, as well as those that perhaps lie outside the box: garden,home, and pet photography are justa few examples (see The Garden Sessions here: https://www.maryfowles.com/garden-sessions).
The over-arching vision of my businessremains the same as it was when I first started out as young ambitious journalistin 2004: to shine a light on worthy stories, to illuminate beauty, and to givea voice to the quiet voices that the world needs to hear more of. Real Life Photography beautiful blendsthe worlds of fine art (cinematic eye, and a love of colour and composition) withjournalism (attention to detail, thorough, professional and intelligent), resultingin a poetic and unique form of storytelling with a distinct visual style that willbring to life the beauty, depth and meaning of any occasion.