We recently connected with Maryna Gliebova and have shared our conversation below.

Maryna, appreciate you joining us today. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?

My work as a photographer has always been about seeing the unseen — not just in terms of light and shadow, but in people themselves. After nearly two decades in portrait photography, I realized that certain faces — especially those of older women — were simply absent from the visual narratives around us. That absence became my mission.

When I moved to the United States from Europe in 2022, I carried with me a deep commitment to visual storytelling. What began as a personal exploration evolved into Silver Waves — an ongoing photographic project dedicated to celebrating gray-haired women who embrace their natural beauty. It’s not just a portrait series; it’s a cultural statement. The mission is to challenge ageism and beauty standards, to give voice and visibility to women who are too often overlooked.

This mission is deeply personal. I come from a generation of women taught to shrink themselves once they pass a certain age. With my camera, I aim to do the opposite — to expand, to spotlight, to honor. That’s why I photograph them not as subjects, but as co-authors of the image. Each portrait is a collaboration, a declaration: “I am here, I am seen, and I am enough.”

On May 16th, 2025, my first solo exhibition in the United States will open in Houston. Titled Light and Shadow, the show brings together my conceptual, cinematic, and self-portrait work — including the American debut of a piece from Silver Waves. Additionally, one of the portraits from the project will be exhibited at ImagiNation London 2025, an international showcase of contemporary photography.

This mission is not a campaign — it’s a lifelong project of reframing how we see each other and ourselves.

Maryna, 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?

I’m Masha Gliebova — a Ukrainian-American photographer currently based in Houston, Texas. I’ve been working in photography professionally for over 17 years, and during that time I’ve photographed more than 3,000 sessions — from intimate portraits to large family gatherings, from conceptual self-portraits to personal visual essays on aging and identity.

My journey into photography began with a deep need to preserve stories — first my own, and then other people’s. Over the years, I’ve become known not only as a visual artist but as a family photographer with a documentary heart. Many of the families I work with have been returning to me year after year — in some cases, for more than a decade. I’ve photographed newborns who are now teenagers, parents who became grandparents, and love stories that grew into generations. That continuity means everything to me.

My mission in family photography is simple: to help people see the beauty in their everyday lives and to preserve that beauty before it slips away. I don’t believe in stiff posing or overdone edits. I believe in real laughter, in quiet glances, in the messy, beautiful in-between moments that say the most about who we are. In a world full of filters and perfection, I offer honesty.

What sets me apart, I think, is this balance: I’m equally committed to art and emotion. I want my images to be beautiful — yes — but more importantly, I want them to matter. I want them to live in someone’s family archive for decades. I want someone’s child to look back and say, “That was my mother. That was our home. That was us.”

I’m proud of every image that helps someone remember — and of every woman who sees herself differently through my lens.

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

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Moving to the United States in 2022 was one of the most difficult — and defining — transitions in my life. I left behind a stable photography career, a community of returning clients, and a professional network I had built over 15 years. Suddenly, I found myself in a new country with no reputation, no connections, and, honestly, with language skills that didn’t yet match my creative voice.

For a while, I felt invisible. I was still the same artist, but I had to prove myself all over again — not just technically, but culturally. Photography is deeply relational; it depends on trust. And trust takes time.

So I started small: by photographing the people around me, by sharing my work through social media, and by entering international competitions. I didn’t stop creating. That was my anchor. I kept working on my long-term project Silver Waves and began submitting my images to juried exhibitions. Slowly, recognition returned. In 2024, my work was selected for shows in Europe and the U.S. In May 2025, I’m opening my first solo exhibition in Houston — a city that once felt like a blank page and now feels like home.

Resilience, for me, meant not giving up on my creative identity even when no one was watching. It meant continuing to speak in my visual language — quietly at first, and then louder — until it was heard again.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

The most rewarding part of being a photographer is knowing that what I create will outlive the moment — and sometimes even the people in it.

When I photograph families, I’m not just capturing smiles for holiday cards. I’m building visual time capsules. I’ve worked with some families for over a decade, watching children grow up, watching parents become grandparents, watching life happen. To be trusted with someone’s history, over and over again — that is a quiet kind of honor that I don’t take for granted.

In my artistic work, the reward comes from connection — when someone looks at one of my conceptual or self-portrait images and sees something of themselves in it. Especially with projects like Silver Waves, I often hear from women who say, “I’ve never seen someone like me portrayed this way before.” That’s the moment I know the work has done its job. It’s not just about creating something beautiful — it’s about creating something that shifts perspective, even a little.

As an artist, I get to move between the deeply personal and the quietly universal. And that — the ability to turn memory, emotion, and identity into something tangible — will always feel like a kind of magic to me.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://mashaglebova.com
• Instagram: @mashaglebova1
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mashaGlebova/

Image Credits

Leah Williams, Olesia Karlova, Vitalia Karlova, Olena Puchkina, Stacy Maag, Karen McCoy Butts, Masha Gliebova