Tamara Abdul Hadi is an Iraqi photographer whose work is deeply rooted in questions of identity and cultural representation. Her photography consistently centres dispossessed and marginalised communities, amplifying voices to those who are rarely heard.

Alongside her artistic practice, she is also an educator, having taught across the Middle East and in Canada. Her works have been published widely in many of the world’s most well-known magazines, though in recent years she has been increasingly drawn towards more intimate, independent publications. In this interview, we speak with Tamara about her photographic journey, her debut monograph "Picture an Arab Man", and the stories behind some of her most significant images.

— How did your first encounter with a camera come about? And when did you realise that photography would become your life’s work?

— I encountered photography before I ever held a camera. My first exposure came through a photography book by Iraqi photographer Nadhim Ramzi — Iraq, The Land and the People, self-published in 1989. I grew up as an Iraqi in the diaspora, and I remember sitting on my parents’ living-room carpet when I was around ten years old, leafing through the book and being completely absorbed by Ramzi’s photographs of everyday Iraqis, taken between the 1950s and 1960s.

Through these images, I learned about my homeland. They fed my imagination and shaped how I understood a place I knew mostly through stories. After university, I graduated with a fine arts degree but felt uncertain about the direction I wanted to take. I bought a second-hand analogue camera from a friend and, very quickly, became obsessed. I began photographing my friends and family, then slowly started developing projects around subjects I was curious about. The rest is history — or at least the last twenty years of it.

— You aren't only a photographer but also a teacher. What drew you to education, and was it a difficult path to establish in the beginning?

— Teaching is a privilege, and the opportunity to share my experience — whether through practical skill-sharing or critical discussion — has always felt deeply meaningful to me. My approach is shaped by my own photographic practice and by an understanding of photography not only as a tool for artistic expression, but also as a medium deeply entangled with questions of ethics, authorship, and representation.

Most recently, during the Winter 2025 semester, I taught a senior research seminar in Media and Journalism at the University of Toronto, focusing on photojournalism and empire. The course examined the links between visual anthropology, colonial power, and imperial histories. The students were incredibly inspiring, with many choosing to confront their own countries’ colonial pasts through their research projects.

— Much of your work centres on the dispossessed and marginalised — refugees, people without homes, communities often overlooked. What pushed you to make this your focus?

— When I first began working on my own photographic projects, I was drawn to subjects and communities I wanted to understand more deeply. Curiosity was the driving force. Part of this also stemmed from my earlier career as a photojournalist — a path I entered almost by chance.

Over time, my focus sharpened as I began paying attention to who was consistently missing from dominant narratives. The dispossessed and marginalised are often spoken about, but rarely listened to. Through my photographs, I hoped to offer an alternative way of seeing — one shaped by proximity, care, and respect.

In my more recent projects, collaboration has become central to my process. Working with people from within the communities I document is now integral to the work. In my forthcoming book, Re-Imagining Return to the Marshes, I am collaborating closely with members of the Ahwari community, whose voices and perspectives are essential to the project.

— I know asking about a “favourite photograph” can feel like choosing between children, but is there one image that holds the deepest emotions for you — and why?

— There isn’t a single image, but a few that have stayed with me over the years. One in particular is a portrait I took of Jack and Adrieh embracing in Ramallah in 2016. I captured it while walking through the city with my friend Tamara, inside an abandoned house. The photograph holds a special place in my heart because it is, above all, a quiet and powerful expression of love.

— The series Picture an Arab Man became such a defining body of work, widely published and discussed. How did the idea first come about — was it carefully planned, or did it emerge more spontaneously?

— The project grew out of a long period of reflection on my own work. For around 15 years, I was working as a photojournalist across Southwest Asia and North Africa, living and moving between places like Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, the UAE and elsewhere across the region. At the time, I was producing photographic stories for well-known Western news outlets and doing what I believed was important, honest work.

But over the years, I began to notice something deeply uncomfortable. I saw how some of my images were being framed, edited, and circulated in ways that reinforced familiar orientalist narratives about the region and its people — narratives I did not recognise, and certainly didn't intend to contribute to. Coming to terms with that was unsettling. It forced me to question not only how images are read, but my own role within that system.

Picture an Arab Man came out of that reckoning. It became my first book and a way of pushing back — of slowing things down and reclaiming space for a different kind of representation. Over five years, between 2009 and 2014, I photographed Arab men in 13 cities across the Arab world. Rather than spectacle or symbolism, I wanted intimacy. I wanted to show tenderness, vulnerability, and quiet presence — to reimagine the contemporary Arab man on his own terms, outside the frameworks that had long defined him.

— Why do you think the work resonated so strongly and received so much attention?

— I think this kind of work remains painfully relevant. It still surprises me — and frustrates me — that we are in a position where Arab men need to be humanised at all. Palestinian men, Lebanese men, Iraqi men are still so often misrepresented, flattened, or outright vilified. Because of that, seeing them portrayed with tenderness and care continues to resonate. People recognise that absence, even if they don’t always name it.

— I was struck by the story you once told about photographing in a barbershop that was later demolished. Could you take us back to that moment — how did you discover it, what drew you there, and what did it come to mean for you?

— I met Mohamad Bakir, a barber in Gaza, while working on my project Salon Al Sha’ab (2016–2020). The series explores barbershops as cultural spaces — places of self-care, intimacy, and community among Arab men in Lebanon and Palestine.

The project began in 2016, while I was in Ramallah. Around that time, a friend introduced me to Tamer Shehadeh, a barber who was then living in Qalandia camp, near the Ramallah–Jerusalem checkpoint. What struck me immediately was Tamer’s artistry and the pride he took in his work, as well as the quiet rituals of care that take place within barbershop walls. That sense of dignity and attention became the foundation of the series.

Later that same year, while I was in Gaza, Tamer introduced me to Mohamad Bakir, the owner of Salon Rimal. I photographed him as part of the same project. The barbershop had been passed down to him by his father, and over the years he had groomed many of the city’s football players there. In May 2016, he published a book titled Historical Encyclopedia of Hairdressing in Gaza, a testament to the depth of his craft and commitment.

Salon Rimal was later destroyed by the war. Mohamad Bakir survived, thankfully, but he is now displaced in southern Gaza. He has since set up a temporary outdoor barbershop, continuing to work and to serve other displaced Gazans.

— What do you think about photography today, when so much of it is created on mobile phones? Do you still feel the camera holds a certain sacredness of its own?

— I have always believed — and I teach this as well — that it isn't about the tool you use, but the intention behind it. Cameras are more accessible than ever, and that accessibility has broadened the language of photography in a really meaningful way. It has shifted the focus away from equipment and towards emotion, instinct, and timing.

It also allows more people to tell their own stories without needing expensive gear, and that matters. In many ways, photography feels more open now — less controlled, less gatekept. At least, that is what I hope.

— We always love asking about the stories behind your photographs. Is there one image whose story often goes unnoticed?

— This photograph is of Alanis Obomsawin, the renowned Abenaki documentary filmmaker, activist, and singer. I took it for Al Hayya Magazine, to accompany an interview by Hoda Adra.

Hoda, Alexi, and I spent an afternoon at Alanis’ home in Montreal, where the portrait was made. She welcomed us with great warmth — offering tea and fruit while sharing stories about her life, her flowers, and the many photographs, garments, and sculptures that fill her home. It was a quiet, generous moment, one that sits gently behind the image people see.

— In one interview, you said: “Documentary photography is definitely not a money-making career. You have to do it for the love of it.” Even knowing that, you chose this path over a more commercial one. Did you ever doubt that decision — or regret it?

— No regrets. No doubts.