Documentary
Longer stories about work, family, place, and life in southern Iran.
Born Bandar Abbas / Based Dubai
Documentary photos from Iran, made with time and care.
I am Mehdi Nazeri, an Iranian photographer born in Bandar Abbas and based in Dubai. I work with people, families, and everyday places across Iran, with a particular connection to the south.
Practice
I stay with a story long enough for it to change.
I came to photography through photomontage and experimentation. Over time, the people and places around me pulled the work toward documentary photography.
I am interested in what daily life reveals slowly: work, illness, family, distance, and the small decisions that shape a person’s sense of home.
Portraiture
Portraits made through attention, conversation, and the right amount of time.
Teaching
Writing, teaching, and practical ways of sharing what photography can do.
Selected Projects
A few series from the archive.
The Archive
The people and places behind the pictures.
Southern Iran
Bandar Abbas, Hormuz, and the coastal south are where many of these stories begin. The heat, color, work, and distance are part of every frame.
Human scale
I keep the camera close to ordinary lives, looking for dignity in labor, family, illness, poverty, ritual, and the everyday work of belonging.
Long attention
The work grows through returning: watching, listening, making pictures, and allowing a story to become more complicated than its first impression.
Field record / 01
Working method
I use the camera to keep asking questions.
I move between observation and participation. I photograph what is in front of me, then keep looking for the relationships and pressures underneath it.
The pictures are direct, but they are not rushed. There is room for humor, discomfort, beauty, and the people who give a place its meaning.
Read the full biography ↗At a glance
Selected information about the artist and the archive.
- Based in
- Dubai, UAE
- Practice
- Social documentary / Portrait / Photomontage
- Focus
- Children, women, life, people, and Iran
- Writing
- Two photography books and published photographic essays
- Education
- Photography teaching and an Android learning application
- Network
- FIAP, Iranian Photographers Association, Hormozgan Photographers Society
- Exhibitions
- Iran, France, Japan, Oman, Turkey, Scotland, United States, Slovenia, Canada, Georgia, Bulgaria ...
- Jury work
- International photography judge
- Founded
- Golden Shot International Photography Awards
Continue through the archive