This is Michelle.

Michelle Nguyen is a photographer currently based in Seattle, Washington and born in San Jose, California. Graduated from UW with a Biology degree with a physiology focus in June of 2021, she will be at UW School of Pharmacy for the next four years. She has four loving pet chickens at home named Parmesan, Clementine, Bok Choy, and Chicken. Besides photography, she likes to pick up a Nerf blaster and play Humans vs Zombies at UW every quarter (her favorite blaster is the Rampage).

Photography started for her a couple years ago when her friend Melody brought a camera to a camp they were at. The two took turns taking pictures of each other as the sun set and shot into the night, messing with the settings on the camera for fun. Over the years, they became more invested in it, getting into light painting and portraiture and trying to push themselves to capture their visions. Then she stumbled upon other creatives’ works like Brandon Woelfel, Calob Castellon, and Ramón Laguía who all fueled her investment into photography even more with inspiration.

Now, she is 20 years young and on a mission to share her love for photography. For her, photography is the study of beauty- she learns how people see themselves and what they consider beautiful, and then she tries to capture it. She learns how other photographers express their interpretations of beauty through their work and then she uses them to deepen not only her understanding of beauty but also the world around her. She also considers herself a creative, using her photography to create art, inspired by the beauty in the ethereal and the energy of quiet awe. Photography to her is very much a social sport. There is no formula or step-by-step diagram to it, unlike a lot of her STEM upbringing, and that’s what keeps photography enticing.

At the end of the day, photography reminds her we are not traveling this journey of life alone, and that’s beautiful.