Simona Hodek Martin

I have been photographing since childhood.  My grandfather's Ricoh was the first camera I owned, and  swear that nothing has taken a better picture since.  My Dad tortured me by making me pose for endless hours before his Yashica twin-lens reflex camera... you know, the kind with the viewfinder on top and if you move left, the image moves right.  For that reason, I never make my subjects wait for a shot. 

On my best images:   My best images are taken on my first visit to a place or early exploring a new idea; Everything looks new, fresh, untouched.

My favorite lens:  The 100mm macro and my awesome Nikon 50mm fixed lens.

My dream assignment:  Embedded with aid workers in disaster stricken locales to bring awareness of the human conditions that exist outside of my protected eco-system. OR, commissioned to photograph botanicals… simply to have an excuse to root around in the dirt with my camera. In the meantime, creating works that evoke my human condition, in my time and place are are primary focus.

Photographer idols:  Aline Smithson, Richard Misrach, Robert Frank, Walker Evans, and Annie Leibovitz. 

Bio

Simona Hodek Martin is a Bay Area photographic artist whose work explores culture, history, and projects that employ photography and collage as a means to examine social, urban, and environmental issues.

Born in Prague, Czech Republic, she emigrated to Los Angeles as a child and received a BS in Civil Engineering from Santa Clara University in California.  Formerly successful in the corporate world responsible for real estate, marketing, and business operations in various capacities both nationally and internationally, Simona now pursues fine art and documentary photography through a unique social and cultural perspective. 

Simona is primarily self-taught since childhood and has studied with various professional photographers including an intensive workshop at Santa Fe Photography Workshops with renowned instructor Aline Smithson. Simona currently lives in Los Altos, CA.

2015: solo show for her Village Enterprise Project at the Neshima Healing Center in Los Altos Hills

2019, August: Midwest Center for Photography, ESCAPE – INTERNATIONAL exhibition

2019, December: Amanda Smith Gallery, juried SURROUNDINGS exhibition

2020, September: Midwest Center for Photography, SUBURBAN ARCHITECTURE exhibition

2022, December: PhotoPlace Gallery, Portrait: Self and Others, juried online exhibit

Simona is an affiliate photographer for ProBonoPhoto.org and a volunteer docent at the Center For Photographic Arts in Carmel, CA.