sophie joseph schwartz

COMMUNITY

Living between Brooklyn and Cleveland, American photographer Sophie Joseph Schwartz works exclusively with a large-format analog camera — embracing slowness, tactility, and the physical demands of film as a way to deepen her connection with her subjects. At a time when images are instantly produced and forgotten, her work reclaims photography as a process rooted in care, intimacy, and presence.

Her ongoing black-and-white series Into the Middle of Things explores the emotional and social landscapes of the LGBTQ community through collaborative portraits that blur the line between subject and author. With tenderness and precision, she captures the fragility of desire, the politics of representation, and the lingering presence of love and loss.

Through analog photography, Schwartz reasserts the value of slowness, authorship, and human presence in an age of automated image culture — capturing intimacy, vulnerability, and honesty within her own community, unafraid to expose itself in front of…