Leslie Spurlock has been a photojournalist and creative portrait photographer and storm chaser over the last 30 years. She has been to Haiti six times and covered numerous protests in the US. She photographed weddings for 14 years, utilizing her photojournalism background to tell the story in her pictures.
Her entry into the NFT ecosystem happened in November 2021 and her first piece minted the following month on Foundation.
Leslie is inspired to give a voice to people that don’t necessarily have one. She sees the humanity in her subjects and wants to tell their story to the world.
She is driven to document the indigenous communities around the world that are disappearing.
Recently, Leslie was in Northeastern India photographing the Apatani people. She is influenced by these indigenous cultures and wants to share their beauty. To capture true moments, she will hang out in these communities for a while without her camera, so that they get used to her presence. Once they don’t pay attention to her, she will pull out the camera and take photos.
Her favorite photojournalists are Lynsey Addario, James Nachtway, and Sebastiao Salgado.
Her favorite NFT artists are Daria @ohHungryArtist, Sammya @Deckle_Edge, Gul @gulyildizart, and F. Dilek @FDilekUyar.
She is a big NFT collector, she spends more money buying than selling NFTs. Her NFT collection has over 2000 and is all over the map; AI, paintings, illustrations, and of course, photography.
When I asked her if she thought the artist as a collector was sustainable, she answered YES. “NFTs/tokenization is here to stay. Most of everything will be tokenized in the future. Artists putting money in, and new collectors coming into the ecosystem make this sustainable.”
If there is one thing she could change in the NFT ecosystem it would be to give more visibility to lesser-named artists. She would love to see artists not have to work so hard to gain attention and collectors.
Her favorite color is blue.
She is currently working to build up her documentary work. She was in Mexico recently, documenting Dia de Los Muertos. 2023 is the year for her to improve her craft as a documentarian and get noticed for her work by being more purposeful and strategic.
She plans to return to the Amazon, and shoot in Papua New Guinea and Borneo over the next year.
The message she wants people to get from her work is to care about humanity. She wants to make the world a better place and for people to care about others outside of their borders.
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