Victor Politis

I am a self-taught photographer based in New York City. My interest in photography began as a teenager in Volos, Greece in the 1960s. As a teenager I borrowed a camera from the town photographer in return for developing his negatives. I am now the CEO and founder of PRI, a financial advisory and project development firm that focuses on the world’s developing markets. My job regularly takes me to remote parts of Africa, Eastern Europe and the Middle East.

Jetting between business meetings around the world I carry a compact camera tucked in to my briefcase. When I can I pack an SLR wit...

I am a self-taught photographer based in New York City. My interest in photography began as a teenager in Volos, Greece in the 1960s. As a teenager I borrowed a camera from the town photographer in return for developing his negatives. I am now the CEO and founder of PRI, a financial advisory and project development firm that focuses on the world’s developing markets. My job regularly takes me to remote parts of Africa, Eastern Europe and the Middle East.

Jetting between business meetings around the world I carry a compact camera tucked in to my briefcase. When I can I pack an SLR with a telephoto lens. 50% of my photos are 'drive-by shootings' - taken from a moving car on the way to an appointment and 90% are taken without looking through the viewfinder. The results are candid images that capture the global rhythm - fleeting crossroads of people, structures and social interaction at street level and globally.

Because of time limitations I usually choose to photograph people. They teach me more about a place than a museum or landmark ever could. In some instances I have returned to a village or marketplace with photos of people I had taken on a previous trip, unbeknownst to them. Reactions from the people I photographed have been so enthusiastic that this has become my motivation.


These photos capture the poetry of rural and urban life on various continents with its subtle, often overlooked incidents and moving, occasionally comic, or even bizarre human parallels. They reveal the similarities in our world with parallels of mood and form, where life, and people intersect. Enjoy a selection of over 80,000 photos from 40 countries.