We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Can Ahtam. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Can below.

Can, appreciate you joining us today. Who is your hero and why? What lessons have you learned from them and how have they influenced your journey?

Mr. Ara Güler, an Armenian-Turkish internationally known photo journalist is my hero! A hero that I had the utmost pleasure to meet, interact with, and got my road paved for me by.

Back when I was taking photography as an elective course in my undergraduate years at Koc University in Istanbul, Turkey. I was majoring in Business Administration and Marketing. Marketing is the use of communication to persuade individuals to make the decision to act. Whether it be buying a product, registering on a website, or signing a petition; marketing is a concept, a strategy that helps shape the decision making process of human behavior. To enhance my knowledge within Marketing, I decided to learn photography as a medium of visual communications, a value-added to my main concentration in Business Administration. I was hoping to learn photography so I could work with directors and creators to brief them on branded campaigns and understand/communicate with them through the same scope. Prior to that, photography has always been an interest of mine as a form of a hobby where I have been using the camera my mom gifted to me during our international travels and documenting everything that stuck out to me from what I considered as my norm. It only made sense to pursue photography within these courses because I already was familiar with it.

That being said, I did not have the best experience at these photography classes as my professor at the time was not the most supportive. She would bash my work in front of the entire class and mock my work. While I respected her vision and experience as a professional photographer with her own level of achievements, I never respected her treatment of another fellow photographer who is interested in learning from her. It was so negative that it had me not want to pursue photography. In that desperate time, I took my poor portfolio at the time to Mr. Güler, who was hanging out at one of his usual locations, a cafe owned by him in the Taksim district of Istanbul. He would occasionally come out for coffee and a smoke and have small talk with the customers and people watch. I went up to him and asked for a small bit of his time. Introduced myself and presented him with my portfolio. He carried himself pretty strongly and behind those eyes there was always some curiosity. He flipped a few pages of my portfolio and looked back at me with a smirk on his face. He asked me “Do you love photography?” and I obviously said “YES!” then the one response he gave me was “Forget your professor! Do what you love! Do what makes you happy!” Hearing that made me really excited, and he probably also saw my work not ready or not strong yet, but at least he knew not to discourage me from this craft and he pushed me in the right direction to pursue what I love. To this day, I never forget that moment and in every shutter click I remember him! Thank you Mr. Güler for being there for me to change my life for the better within a few short minutes.

Mr. Güler sadly passed away back in 2018, but I encourage all the readers to check out his work online so you can see Istanbul through his creative eyes and perhaps those photos will make a difference in your lives for that moment.

Can, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

My name is Can Ahtam and I am a Turkish born and raised, Los Angeles based photographer of 15+ years. My main work focuses on landscape, street, and portraiture and I supply them in either digital format or in various mediums of print via my website and other retail channels.

I enjoy the simplicity in my work. I think someone should look at a photo and instantly be able to see what I see rather than struggle to see what I see. Struggling is not fun! I want to carry the viewer to my perspective, to that moment as quickly as possible.

I’ve worked with clients for fashion/editorial shoots as well as done social media related work for clients varying in industries of transportation, technology, and hospitality.

How did you build your audience on social media?

I’ve always looked for a type of platform that enabled me and empowered me to share my vision of the world with others and connect with them. Instagram did that for me back in 2012. I started my account back then with the overall impression that sharing photos from my Canon camera would defeat the purpose of Instant so I was trying to keep a discipline of separating my DSLR photos from my iPhone 3G photos. Those mobile photos were the usual, a stray cat in Istanbul, my ugly breakfast,…etc. To me, sharing photos from my DSLR felt like cheating as it was not Instant. Looking around me, however, and connecting with other creators; I was always encouraged to share my DSLR photos on there to grow. The moment I started doing that, I was living in Boston, Massachusetts, so all my photos were very local with a mix of past archive photos. The moment I started sharing my DSLR photos, however, there was a growing interest on my Instagram profile, @canahtam. So much so that I was selected as a “Suggested User” by Instagram multiple times which gave me the boost I needed. On top of that, Instagram used to have Worldwide Instameets organized by their former Community Managers that helped me socialize with these creators in person and grow my name and my presence even more. One of the Instameets we had organized in Bushwick, NY, actually got picked up by Instagram and Mashable.

That being said, Instagram has evolved a ton since those good old days. Content is still king, but photo is on the back-burner now on Instagram and video has taken its place. I am a native photographer from pre-Instagram era, so I would never follow trends and switch my focus to video because of that, but the platform I used to enjoy is diminishing in its value as photography’s value is diminishing on there.

My recommendation for those who are interested in growing on social media is to pursue what is working for them and create an authentic voice and image of your profile or channel. Whether it be Instagram or TikTok or YouTube, there are others just like you out there waiting to connect with you, you just need to be out there yourself as well. I am extremely fortunate to have made so many wonderful connections through Instagram and the community we were able to foster through there and I know those connections will live on past the social media platforms.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

I am very selective with my work. So selective that one could say I am being extremely picky even! What I see as the most rewarding aspect of being an artist in my field is how others perceive my work. I may hate it, but the moment someone else looks at it and falls in love with it, it reminds me of how harsh i am being on myself and my work. It helps me see outside of my “simple” box and helps me see something others are able to see that I have yet to train myself to see and understand. In that special moment, the connections go deeper and the creation is celebrated by recognizing these different aspects together with the viewer.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.canahtam.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/canahtam
• Other: www.tiktok.com/canahtam

Image Credits
Photography by Can Ahtam