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Sarah Kaja
@withsarahkaja
Best of the week 27 at #nomadict 2021
For the past 15 years I’ve worked as an art director and brand strategist. I craft my client’s ideas into clear authentic expressions. Over the years doing so, I have been happy to work with brands such as PUMA, CAA, Playboy, Cirque du Soleil, Trek Bicycle, and global celebrities like Halle Berry. I believe in building long-lasting relationships and I love bringing their vision to life, creating work that captures emotion and captures an audience.
In that regard, photoshoots have always been my favorite part of the job. The visual style of a brand is a core element of its DNA; by changing the perspective, composition, or mood you change the story being told. And that is really at the heart of both branding and photography: storytelling. I’ve always loved storytelling whether through photography, illustration, design, or creative writing.
"I love transporting people to places, evoking feelings of wonder and adventure and capturing inspiring moments."
What I noticed though, is that it’s really hard to be creative sitting at a desk. New cultures, landscapes, history, art and textiles – meeting new people, learning new perspectives – that’s how I learn and grow and get inspired. I love history and ancient cultures and sometimes I wish I lived in a different era. Back in the days of the explorers like Marco Polo – taking a caravan or ship to unknown lands and cultures. Being the first on the frontier. It’s almost a natural high, that sense of awe, that buzz of anticipation not knowing what is around the next turn. I’ve always been passionate about visual arts and the outdoors and travel.
"I really like rugged, raw wild places! If I can hike there, even better."
My desire to focus more on what I love and find a way to take longer trips and work more on the road, led me to my first turning point four years ago. After many years of gaining experience in the field, I decided to start my own branding agency. Before that I had recently acquired a Fuji XT1 to take to Patagonia and I started to take composition and photography lighting more seriously and learn Lightroom (not just presets). I also began to look into the business side of photography. Outdoor adventure clients are some of my favorites but I’d love to get more involved in the tourism industry.
"I’d love to share the adventures and knowledge of places I’m going to."
After quarantine we decided to give up our apartment in Los Angeles and hit the road and see where it takes us. We were recently in Kyrgyzstan, I’m in Spain now and Scotland is next. Then who knows?
It was in Kyrgyzstan that I took the winning photo. My boyfriend’s uncle Paul actually turned me onto Kyrgyzstan. He was the most knowledgeable and passionate person I ever met about a country he’s never visited. It was his dream to do the Pamir Highway and see sights along the ancient Silk Road. He passed from cancer during COVID and when we were starting to think of where we wanted to go as soon as quarantine ended, we knew we had to go to Kyrgyzstan for Paul. Don’t tell the Burana Tower, but there’s a little bit of Paul sprinkled there. He would have loved the people, the landscapes, the food and late night conversations with fellow travelers. We actually want to come back when we can do the full Pamir Highway, for Paul.
I’m a big planner. I book our flights and accommodation months in advance. I scout locations online and create multi page photo reference pages before I go on any shoot. We hadn’t planned to go to Tash Rabat initially (the Silk Road caravanserai along the Chinese border) but we started reading about it and then we regretted not having added it to the itinerary. The night before I took the winning shot there, my boyfriend and I were debating and he was like: “we should just go. We cancel our last day in Bokonbayevo and we leave at dawn.”
"You always say you’ll see something ‘next time’ but then you never end up coming back. So we took off at sunrise. Totally unplanned."
We had no yurt booked and prayed they had space or we’d be sleeping in our Land Cruiser. We showed up and got the last yurt just outside Tash Rabat, ate an incredible noodle soup with a Kyrgyz family and it even snowed that night while we were cozy by our coal fire.
The photo was taken the next morning, when driving back to Naryn. We had just walked through a 600 year old stone caravanserai, just the two of us – this curmudgeonly old woman opened it up just for us and it was almost eerie wandering the maze of 31 dark domed rooms and feeling so small surrounded by so much history. I definitely was still in that place of awe during our drive toward Naryn as we saw the Tian Shan mountains appear on the horizon.
I knew at some point on the trip I wanted to capture the vastness, the massive scale of Kyrgyzstan’s landscape. I saw that lone rider, the jagged Tian Shan range behind him wrapped in clouds, and told my boyfriend to stop the car. I almost jumped out when the car was still moving! I love the spontaneity of that shot. The mountains had this amazing hazy blue tone and when editing the photo, I pushed the ground a bit more in that orange complementary color direction. Some photos take a really long time to edit. Honestly I knew what I wanted with this one right away.
"If I learned anything from that shot, it’s that when an opportunity presents itself, go for it. When you learn about a new fascinating spot, drop plans and go see it."
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