A lens on the unseen

Tamara Abdul Hadi carries the traces of several places in her practice. Born in the United Arab Emirates to Iraqi parents, she grew up in Montreal, Canada, before finding her way to Beirut, Lebanon. Her early years were shaped by the books in her family library, volumes like Return to the Marshes and Iraq: The Land and The People, which offered glimpses of an ancestral landscape through photography. This connection to the image preceded her professional career.

Before focusing on her own photographic projects, she worked within the fast-paced environment of news agencies. In 2005, she served as a photojournalist and editor at Reuters News Agency in Dubai. Later, her work appeared in publications such as The New York Times, The Guardian, The Wall Street Journal, and The Financial Times. These years of documenting immediate events provided a foundation for the more intimate, long-term studies that define her current practice.

The weight of representation

Her photography often settles on the quiet details of communities that are frequently viewed through a narrow lens in Western media. In her series Picture an Arab Man, which began in 2009, she turns her camera toward the individual. The images do not focus on the political or the loud; instead, they present portraits of men—often bare-chested against plain backgrounds—to highlight ethnic diversity and personal features like wavy hair or textured skin. This work seeks to move away from the stereotypes of violence or oppression often found in mainstream news.

This interest in the specifics of daily life extends to The People’s Salon, a project started in 2016. Here, she documents the ritual of grooming in barbershops across Lebanon and Palestine, specifically in neighborhoods like Gaza, Ramallah, and Beirut. The camera captures the use of charcoal and gold face masks, the precision of fades, and the atmosphere of communal self-care. These spaces, often run by displaced people, become sites of stability and personal identity.

Collaborative roots

The practice is not a solitary one. She is a founding member of the RAWIYA Collective, a group formed to support female photographers working in the Middle East. This collaboration offers a way to counter the isolation that often comes with documentary work. As a member of THE MEDIUM artist collective, she continues to engage with interdisciplinary creators.

Her teaching also brings her into direct contact with local communities. She conducts photography workshops in several countries, including:

• Palestine
• Egypt
• Iraq
• Lebanon
• Tunisia

Through these sessions, she shares technical knowledge of digital and documentary photography while learning from the stories of the people she meets.