Serra Akcan is a freelance photographer in Istanbul, Turkey, and one of the founding members of NarPhotos, a collective of photographers from Turkey started in 2003. She had studied in Boston in the United States, graduating in 1999, and returned to Turkey to work mostly as an assistant to an advertising photographer. “I always wanted to work with magazines, but it was hard at that time.” Just starting out, she couldn’t quite find a place in the photo industry, but she did find others in a similar position.
“We were going through the same difficulties. It was hard to make stories and earn money. Some were making event photography. Some were making photography for private companies. I earned my living for like seven or eight years with wedding photography, we were earning money from other stuff and then funding [the stories we wanted to produce.”