In a world that often tries to shrink us, creativity becomes a way of widening our existence. This photo essay is rooted in the belief that for BIPOC artists, making art is more than expression, it is resistance, survival, and a quiet reclamation of space. To create is to insist on presence. It is to say, I am here, in a landscape that does not always make room for us.
To Create Is to Endure focuses on BIPOC photographers and image-makers across Chicago whose practices explore identity, memory, and representation. Each portrait I took of a photographer is paired with documentary-style moments of process, loading film, setting up light, reviewing contact sheets—all captured inside studios and personal workspaces. These in-between moments reveal how the lens becomes both a tool of expression and a form of survival, shaping how artists see themselves and how their communities are seen.
As a photographer, I approach this work not just as a documentarian, but as someone who understands the quiet labor of capture. I move through these spaces with care, curiosity, and kinship, listening as much as I shoot. My hope is to show how creativity functions as both refuge and defiance: how making art allows people to claim space, shape identity, and imagine futures beyond limitation.
These images are not only about finished work, but about the labor around it: the pauses, the hands at work, the soft focus moments where identity is shaped and reshaped. Together, Han, Josue, Sam, and Carlos form a visual archive of what it means to make, to endure, and to affirm yourself. Photography looks different for each of them, but its heart remains the same: expression, honesty, and the search for connection. Across their experiences, they explore what it means to create with intention, endure through uncertainty, and see the world with openness. Their work stands as a testament to artists who keep building, imagining, and breathing life into the spaces they inhabit.
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Han
Han on cam is a Chicago-based photographer whose work is guided by intuition, spirituality, and a deep relationship to nature. Raised in Southern Illinois with open land and cornfields behind her home, she learned to observe the world slowly, watching light, animals, and silence. That early closeness to land continues to shape her visual language today.
Her practice centers feeling over spectacle. She photographs as a way to stay in conversation with life itself. Faith, flow, and grounding are central to how she moves through the world and her work. Community also anchors her process; she finds healing in being seen by other artists who understand the balance between survival and creation. For Han, photography is not about politics or performance, but about presence, intuition, and the courage to keep expressing.
Josue Cuyun
Josue Cuyun, also known as Damen, is a Chicago-based photographer working primarily with film. He was drawn to its slowness and honesty. His practice is rooted in perspective—both visual and emotional. Photography became a way for him to navigate hardship by shifting how he sees the world. Each frame offers a chance to pause, reorient, and breathe.
Learning film taught him patience and trust in the process. His images often hold memory and longing for what was there and what was already slipping away. Josue’s work reflects a quiet attentiveness to everyday life, encouraging openness, curiosity, and presence. For him, photography is less about perfection and more about staying connected to the moment.
Sam Wilson
Sam Wilson is a Chicago-based photographer and visual artist whose work centers emotional truth, introspection, and care. She uses photography as a language for feelings that don’t yet have names. Creating becomes a way to be honest with herself and with the world.
Sam’s work is rooted in lineage and love. She comes from people who heal through reflection and giving back, and that sensibility shapes her approach to image-making. Sam photographs as both self-portrait and offering. Her practice is about momentum, growth, and trusting that the art she makes now will speak to her future self. For Sam, photography is a space where vulnerability becomes clarity.
Carlos Martinez
Carlos Martinez is a multidisciplinary artist and photographer based in Chicago whose work moves between drawing, writing, woodworking, and photography. Creativity has always been essential to his survival, it is how he processes grief, identity, and uncertainty when words fall short.
His images are deeply personal. Each photograph carries his emotional state, his questions, and his history. He sees art as both resistance and therapy, a way to endure when the world feels heavy. Vulnerability is central to his practice; he believes that to ask truth from others, he must bring his own. Carlos creates so people don’t just see his work, but recognize themselves inside it.
About the Author + Photographer: Genesis Falls, known as Geno, is a Chicago-based film photographer whose black-and-white work captures the raw essence of humanity. Inspired by childhood moments with her grandfather’s instant camera, she pursued Cinematography at Flashpoint Chicago and now focuses on unseen stories and unfiltered lives. Exhibiting at spaces like Evanston Art Center and as part of the Black Women Photographers collective, Geno earned the 2023 Black Women’s Photography & Flickr Grant. Influenced by Gordon Parks’s philosophy, she uses vintage cameras to create intimate, tactile images that honor resilience and challenge viewers to reflect on humanity’s shared beauty and strength. @geno_tatted
