Ryan Koopmans is a Dutch / Canadian fine art and documentary photographer, primarily interested in issues involving the points of intersection where the natural and manmade converge. He has received several awards including the NY Photo Awards 2012 winner in the Student Documentary Single Image Category and has exhibited work in a wide range of platforms such as NPR Radio Pictures, Oxford University Press, Le Journal Du Dimanche (le JDD), Document Journal magazine, UNICEF’s Next Generation 3rd Annual Photo Benefit, and Filter festival 2014.
Paradise Now
Paradise Now explores how urban fantasies and construction function as expressions of nationalistic ambition, blurring the line between the natural and artificial within the hypermodern city. Paradise Now is driven by my ongoing curiosity into the human condition, and a desire to visually interpret socio-cultural phenomena within both natural and man-made landscapes. I am drawn, photographically, to the world’s rapidly-expanding and hyper-globalized cities, particularly those that have invested heavily in large-scale urban planning and modernist/futurist architecture. I find that the topographically surreal environments that are products of that planning and architecture set the stage for interesting photo opportunities, from close up and afar.
To view more of Ryan’s work please visit his website.