Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Lia Hansen. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Lia, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Let’s talk legacy – what sort of legacy do you hope to build?

It’s honestly a tough question but I hope that I have somehow inspired people to create. To experiment with their art and have fun doing it. There really is no greater feeling that seeing a piece somebody made that was inspired by something I created.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I have always loved photography, art and music but never really thought about combining those three things into one before. I remember scrolling through instagram one day and coming across one of Matty Vogel’s photographs of Billie Eilish and being in awe of the way it was edited. I hadn’t really been exposed to creative photography and always had been told I “overedited” and “didn’t tell a story” with my photos. I think seeing that there was this entire style of work really made me want to pick up a camera and see what I could create.

I went to my first concert last year and brought my little Panasonic Lumix point and shoot. The photos turned out absolutely terrible and never saw the light of day, but I was hooked. There really is nothing like the energy of a live show. The music, the colours, the lighting, the people, the energy. I went to a couple of shows later on in the year, brought my point and shoot and just had fun trying to take photos. Eventually, I bought a DSLR and started experimenting with portrait photography to build a portfolio, hoping to be able to shoot a show. I remember sending out like a hundred emails with my (very insubstantial) portfolio to publications to see if there was a way I could get a photo pass and eventually got a response.

My style is always changing and developing but I love pushing the limits of editing. I think shooting so many shows on a point and shoot from the crowd forced me to be creative with ways of covering up the noise and lack of quality in the raw images.

I am still extremely new to photography and concert photography especially but it has been incredible to learn and grow my skills. I am so excited for the future and where it takes me and incredibly grateful for the support so far!

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

I think that anything in the creative industry requires a lot of resilience. You get a hundred rejections before you get a yes and it can be incredibly frustrating. Something that I have gotten a lot better at is not comparing my work with others but it can get really difficult to not get in your head when things aren’t working out.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

The community. I am always in awe of how supportive and kind other artists are. I also do content creation and YouTube unrelated to photography and that was one of the things I noticed when I first starting posting my work online. I think certain niches or areas might be a bit less like this but within the art/photography community online people are so helpful and encouraging. It’s a really incredible thing.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: www.instagram.com/liahansenphoto
• Other: www.tiktok.com/@liahansenphoto

Image Credits
Lia Hansen