The Creative Advisors
Every one of them arrived at our academy believing their photography had gone as far as it could go
Nineteen artists who came looking for a way to break through, stayed the course with Martin Osner, and now showcase their work on this page. Many of them have gone on to exhibit on a gallery wall, to a real audience.
19
Creative advisors, and counting
8
Countries, across three continents
1
Programme, finished by all of them
How this creative journey happens
Nobody arrives confident
The pattern repeats so exactly that we can almost tell the time by it.
At the start
Apprehensive, and rightly so
Everybody comes in unsure. You are being asked to put down the thing you are already good at and be a beginner again, in public, in front of people you have never met.
Then
They stay the course
Every artist on this page finished the programme. Not most of it, all of it. That is the single thing they have in common and it is the reason the work below exists.
Along the way
They find each other
They are scattered across eight countries, and some have gone out of their way to visit one another. Same mindset, same obsession, and friendships that will last a lifetime.
And now
They give it back
They answer questions properly in the community, they give real feedback, and they help the people coming in behind them get to where they got. Nobody asked them to. It is simply the love they have for the fine art of photography.
“They came in feeling their photography had hit a ceiling. They are now showing their work to the world, and helping others do the same.”
Their creative talent
One piece each, chosen by the artist
Every one of these began as a photograph. Click any artist to see the rest of what they make, in their own words.
Tra.Bant
Toni Niederwieser
Fieberbrunn, Austria
Fifty years of photography, most of it circling one mountain above his home town, now combined with acrylic paint and freehand work that pulls the landscape towards memory.
See Toni's work
Weeping Angel
Craig O'Flaherty
Cape Town, South Africa
A poet as much as a photographer, drawn to what an image is still becoming rather than what it settles into, and content to leave the question open.
See Craig's work
DeVerra
Leonie Scholtz
Still Bay, South Africa
A doctor's eye and an artist's, held in the same frame. Years of wildlife and Arctic work led her to nitro transfer, and now she paints onto her portraits.
See Leonie's work
Morning Flight
Engela Gobregts
Cape Town, South Africa
A career in environmental education behind her, she photographs as an act of mindfulness, looking for the light inside the shadow and making the work first for her own soul.
See Engela's work
Silent Majesty
Gill Davies
Exmouth, Devon, United Kingdom
Began as a photographer and moved steadily towards interpretation, layering encaustic wax, colour transfers, inks and pastels until each image becomes a single object rather than a print.
See Gill's work
Mystery Tree
Andre de Koker
Napier, South Africa
Fourteen years of looking patiently at the Overberg, where rural stillness rewards the wait, then taken further with hand techniques, digital overlays and encaustic medium.
See Andre's work
Boko
Paulina Rodriguez Arango
Mexico
Thirty five years of environmental portraits and the small unnoticed corners of family life, now moving away from the figure towards something more exploratory and abstract.
See Paulina's work
Silent Alliance
Detlev Bock
Achern, Germany
He works until a photograph stops behaving like evidence. Faces are covered, stained and rebuilt, and it is in that damaged surface that the feeling of the work lives.
See Detlev's work
Shadow-Self
Lize du Plessis
Cape Town, South Africa
Back at photography after three decades away, working across infrared, macro and multiple exposure, then layering wax, paint, botanicals and metal leaf over what the camera found.
See Lize's work
The Rebuilt Horizon
Grace Remondo
Cape Town, South Africa
Memory, loss and restoration, held in prints she treats as objects. Photomontage, heavy acrylics, mica powder, and gold thread stitched by hand into the paper.
See Grace's work
Homage to Tretchikoff
Hanli Smit
Johannesburg, South Africa
A designer as much as a photographer, she builds the costume, the make-up and the props before the shutter goes. Photographer of the Year in 2020, and still competing internationally.
See Hanli's work
Crossing paths
Mia Joubert
Pretoria, South Africa
Years as a dancer taught her how a body carries feeling, and it shows. She photographs dancers under jacarandas, then works back into the image with paint, clay and transfers.
See Mia's work
No Quarter
David Schlosser
Essex Fells, United States
Bold, layered and strongly narrative, circling identity, memory and the pressure of modern life, and finding most of it in ordinary streets rather than anywhere exotic.
See David's work
Toward the Light
Tara Crossley
Rome, Italy
From newspaper and documentary assignments to transfers, layering and overpainting, and lately to observational drawing and oil, looking for the point where the three meet.
See Tara's work
When Branches become Air
Ann Baret
Somerset West, South Africa
She signs her work Kaniek, and makes photographs that are less about seeing than feeling, layering landscape and light until the known dissolves into the imagined.
See Ann's work
Suspended in Time
Ghail Binneman
Pretoria, South Africa
Landscape led her to macro, and macro led her to wax. She loves encaustic for the texture it builds, and looks to Monet and Degas rather than to other photographers.
See Ghail's work
A Beautiful Seascape
Alan Mason
Johannesburg, South Africa
He signed up for a landscape course in 2019 with four friends, and sold his first painting two exhibitions later. Now he is in a studio every week with acrylic and watercolour.
See Alan's work
Karoo Winter
Gillian Mager
Komani, South Africa
Wildlife was the first love and the bush is still where she goes to find herself. Trees have taken over lately, painted and waxed as often as they are photographed.
See Gillian's work
Untitled
Lesley Spiegel
Vancouver, Canada
Photography as a starting point rather than an ending. Hand embroidery, fabric and intentional camera movement turn the familiar into something quietly unexpected.
See Lesley's workFrom online showcase to framed exhibition
Printed, framed, and hung on a wall
Many of these artists have exhibited at the Osner Gallery in Hout Bay, Cape Town, in the IGNITE Exhibition, and you will find their names in the catalogue. Real prints, properly framed, in a real show, with people standing in front of the work and talking about it.
That step matters more than it sounds. A photograph on a screen is a file. The same photograph printed, framed and lit is an object somebody can want, and seeing your own work treated that way changes what you believe you are capable of. It is also the moment most of them stopped calling themselves photographers.
The Academy's own online gallery opens shortly, and the work of these artists will be shown there too.
IGNITE Exhibition ’25
Emerging Artist Showcase, Osner Gallery, Hout Bay. The full catalogue, free to download, no email address needed.
Download the catalogueWhat a creative advisor is
Not a title we easily hand out
Our creative advisors are accomplished members of the Art Photography Academy who completed the Masterclass programme with Martin Osner, and who are currently producing work of a genuine exhibition standard. They are active voices in our community, answering questions, sparking ideas and helping shape the direction of the Academy. This page is their space to be seen, honoured and celebrated.
One
They finished the Masterclass
The full programme, not a module of it. Every artist on this page saw it through, which is why they can speak to anybody who is halfway and wavering.
Two
The work is exhibition standard
That is the bar, and it is judged on the work rather than on time served or on how long somebody has been a member.
Three
They are in the community daily
Answering questions, giving honest feedback on unfinished work, and helping shape where the Academy goes next.
Are You Inspired? Your Journey Begins With a Single Step
The artists on this page began exactly where you may be standing now, curious, perhaps uncertain, and drawn by a quiet sense that there was something more to be made with a camera. What you see here is the result of dedication, courage, and the kind of sustained creative growth that comes from working within a truly supportive community.
If their work has moved you, or if something here has stirred a sense of what might be possible for you, we would love to welcome you to the beginning of your own journey.
Begin Your Journey in Fine Art PhotographyEvery artist on this page began with Getting Started in Art Photography.
At the Art Photography Academy we believe there is an artist in everyone.
This page is the evidence.
