MANHATTAN

photography for the most recognized landmarks in New York City.

Through his many projects, including publishing five major books of photography and limited-edition art prints of New York City, Joseph has photographed the work of the world’s finest architects, as well as many distinguished private residences: His work has been featured at The Venice Biennale for Architecture in Italy.

In the few hours each week when Joseph is not taking pictures for his clients, he can be found at home with his wife, dogs and two children.

“For various reasons, I wanted Evan Joseph, the superstar of photographers, to have a big juicy feature in our magazine,” says Eklund | Gomes co-founder Fredrik Eklund. “He’s not just a bestselling published author, he’s an artist that goes beyond just photographing the properties. I think what’s interesting is that as he’s grown, so have we. There are very few people like Evan that we have worked with since the inception. It’s been a very intimate relationship: He’s seen the good, bad, and ugly with us and literally captured it on camera.”

Says Eklund | Gomes west coast Realtor Seth Nelson, “What Evan does is so extremely important to the process. We live in a world of storytelling, and he tells stories through the lens. In a world where the average consumer has a three second bandwidth of attention, we rely on what guys like Evan can create. It’s probably one of the most important parts of the entire process.”

JOHN GOMES: How did you get started in residential photography?

EVAN JOSEPH: I’ve always been the art kid. If there was a spirit week painting to be hung in the gym, I would make it. If you wanted to have the graphic for Dark Side of the Moon with skull and roses painted on the back of your denim jacket, I could hook you up with that. My uncle got me my first camera when I was 13. I loved it. It was such a great way to sketchbook for ideas in composition, in light and color. I couldn’t believe how much easier it was than painting and drawing.

I’ve always been a still painter. Today, if you leave me alone with nothing to do, I’ll paint a couple of bottles on a windowsill to practice my sense of composition, and it translates into interior/architectural photography. I try to capture the fundamental feeling that you get when you’re in a space. Not just the square footage; anybody can stand in the corner with a wide-angle lens and show you that the place looks big. For me it’s about finding these compositions and moments to build a visual story about what makes a place so special.

In high school, I was the school yearbook/newspaper photographer. I had a dark room next to the chemistry lab and I would stay for hours after school developing pictures. After college, I ran an art gallery in Beverly Hills, on Rodeo Drive of all places. Because I had this language for speaking about art — I looked older than I was, and I acted older — I fell into this sales job. That became a good foundation for understanding what goes into creating romantic stories that inspire the experience of luxury.

When the digital revolution came around the turn of the millennium, I went back to school and got a master’s degree in digital media at NYU and then started a digital media company. One of our first clients was a real estate agency. I asked, “Where are the photos gonna come from for your new website?” They said, “Anybody, our photographer just quit.” I said, “Oh I’ll do it. Can I sell that old film camera and get one of these newfangled digital cameras?” They said, “Sure, go for it.” And so, 25 years ago I became one of the very first photographers using digital cameras and Photoshop in the real estate and interiors business. That changed the game. It made it possible to make images that were way more perfect looking than had ever really been made in the past.

The photography is the hunter gatherer part. Although I have a lot of fun in real estate, I do go out into the city to capture ‘neighborhood photography.’ I’m sneaking up on people holding hands and eating ice cream cones and walking down a treelined street and capturing those moments. Photoshop is the cooking part. This ever-evolving process is I how I was able to scale. I’ve systematized it to the point where I may not be able to take every photo, but I can participate in the creation of every photo.

SETH NELSON: When did you and John and Fredrik first meet?

EVAN JOSEPH: We all met in Sarah Jessica Parker’s house. I was so intimidated by you guys. You were already such a big deal and I had been working with every other superstar agent in the city at that point. I had plenty of big shot clients who were super demanding, but I remember asking out of curiosity, “Why am I here? Why did you guys reach out to me?” And John was the one that said, “Your post-production is amazing, the level of finish and your photos are perfect.” I said, “All right, this guy gets it.”

JOHN GOMES: Clearly, you’re an artist, but at the same time you’re running this huge business. How do you manage that?

EVAN JOSEPH: I have to give props to my wife, Amy. She was a broker before the kids were born, so she has a sense of how the business works. But building the business is a direct result of my philosophy, which is to say yes to everything. When that happens, suddenly you find that you can’t be everywhere at once. When I started on my own, I paid such close attention to every detail and over delivered by a factor of a million on every photo that I was able to snowball that effort into a career.

So, to serve my clients, I’ve had to clone myself a little. I credit my master’s degree in digital media, which helped me understand how to leverage technology to create processes that can be scaled. Right now, it’s steady growth, but I want to be more in Florida, Texas and California. Firstly, I want to make sure that it’s seamless: When you are in California and you work with our team, you’re getting the same experience that you get in New York where my eyes are on everything.

The other way to build a business is with the trust of clients. And I think of our studio the same way that I would like to think of the painting and sculpture studios of Renaissance Italy. They all depended on patrons that believed in them. So, I look at you and Frederick like the Medicis. You’re able to use your resources both to build your own brand, but also to help us develop as artists.

I appreciate how you guys don’t micromanage and believe in me as an artist. I always tell people, “Just let me shoot.” You’re gonna get so much more by just letting me do what I do, not just in terms of creativity and vision. You get more pictures too, because I’ve got more time to focus and think because I want to impress you. That’s where I’m coming from. I want you to be thrilled. I want every single photo shoot to get an email back that says, “Oh my god, these are amazing.” I never get tired of hearing it because I put my heart and soul into every single image. And it’s gratifying to know that it’s received.

JOHN GOMES: I just described you as an artist, but I could also describe you as a perfectionist. You have a very high standard that matches your high level of quality. So how do you find new talent?

EVAN JOSEPH: I start by working with friends and I think that really helps. The people on my team have become very close to me. When you share an artistic vision, that really goes beyond a business relationship. There must be an incredibly high level of trust, understanding, and an approach not just to art, but to client services. Anybody that shoots for our studio represents all of us and they need to act the part to look the part. I know

Passion Project

“My new personal art project obsession: aerial photos of the infrastructure around NYC, including the ports and refineries, which I think are super-cool and will be the focus of my new NFT offering and gallery shows. This material is my “passion project” for sure — it requires trespassing via small helicopter over secure facilities that are belching burning methane at me, but the images are worth it! They are quite abstract and different from my other work, and I might be the only person in the world who thinks they are interesting...but I hope not!” -

Evan Joseph

that you guys understand that, too. You have a beautiful bouquet of individuals on your team, and all of them have that Eklund Gomes magic. I’m sure that’s not easy to find.

JOHN GOMES: Listening to you speak, it’s clear that you have a passion for your work, but watching you in action, seeing your results, is really remarkable. Now I know of at least five books that you published. What are some of your other projects?

EVAN JOSEPH: It’s fun to have a long form project to work on, to sink my teeth into, something that’s going to take months working with a team of people that are outside my normal business. That process excites me, and it’s led to several gallery shows of the work in the books. That’s led to this increased visibility, to see my work in Chelsea right now for Edge on a giant billboard on 25th Street or rolling down Broadway on double decker buses, it’s very special. I’ve photographed the advertising for every one of the observation decks in New York City. There are five of them. There’s the Empire State Building, Edge, World Trade Center, One Vanderbilt and Top of the Rock. All of them use me for their advertising. They need to capture and convey the romance and visual appeal of New York City and I find a way to tell that story about how magnificent this city is and convey that to the whole world. That’s very much a career highlight and it’s a result of the increased visibility from the books and the gallery shows.

JOHN GOMES: So, I just wonder, with all of this, what is on the horizon?

EVAN JOSEPH: New York From Above, my most recent book, while it’s only a couple years old, is already kind of outdated because the city changes every time you blink. I want to create a new version of that with all new photography and this time, I’m not going through a publisher. I’m going direct and I want to take the reins away from the big international publishers that I’ve been working with and connect directly with my audience and with my friends, to do something where I’m the last word on which picture goes where in what book. I’m cooking up an NFT project that will allow collectors and supporters and patrons to own NFTs of the images in the book and use those funds to print a new version of the book directly. So, I’m excited about that and about celebrating a decade of being in the air over New York City taking pictures.

SETH NELSON: There’s clearly no shortage of photographers out there. What separates you and your photography from the rest?

EVAN JOSEPH: I think the ability to empathize with my clients and to understand their business needs is an important part of what we do at the studio. It’s certainly an important part of the training that all our photographers go through. We always say: “Think like a broker, shoot like a broker.” You have to understand this, because there’s not a lot of intersectionality between artists and brokers. Those head spaces are very different. And you need to dig into what a developer, real estate broker, designer, or an architect needs from their images. This is a “business to business” business. And I think that’s a very distinguishing quality. We can use our empathy and vision to see the world through our clients’ eyes. It’s not enough for it just to be a pretty picture. These pictures go to work, and I want them to do their job.

JOHN GOMES: As you stated, when you began in the industry, your competitive advantage was that you were digital and that was really the beginning of the digital era of photography in residential real estate and interiors. How has the business changed over the years with new technology?

EVAN JOSEPH: Occasionally, I get a panic attack that photography’s going to become irrelevant. So far it hasn’t happened because I think that there’s always a need to linger over an image. As beautiful as video can be, it never gives you time to just sit and be with that image and those feelings that are aroused by it. Technology has raised expectations. Being Quickly adapting to those improvements in technology to create increasingly better pictures is what I’m all about. With video, it’s a challenge to create a feel like our photos and that’s what we’re trying to do. We may never get there, but that’s my quest to make, to incorporate new technologies into our vision so that it feels like us. So that video from Evan Joseph Studios doesn’t feel like the YouTuber with the $54 million across the front. When we get into VR, I want to make stuff for it. I have 3D cameras now. I don’t know what the heck they’re gonna be applicable for to my clients, but I have 3D cameras and 3D stereo video so that we can capture imagery that can be used in virtual reality. Does it make buyers sick? I don’t know. I don’t care. I’m just experimenting. I want to be there for every new thing and to try to make it my own.

JOHN GOMES: Yeah, one of the reasons I keep picking up the phone to call you to shoot our listings is because you are experimental, because you are collaborative and it’s exciting to work in this space as the industry has evolved over the years. I think that’s one of the biggest parts of your success because every now and again, in your experiment, you find a new way. One of the things that I love about you is you have a very high standard that you hold to yourself and your whole entire team. So again, I think that’s a huge part of your success. I thank you so much for everything that you do and for your friendship as well over the very many years that we have worked together.

EVAN JOSEPH: Thank you. And John, I could not do it without you.

JOHN GOMES: That’s what I mean about collaborative.

EVAN JOSEPH: You and Fredrik are The Medici to my Michelangelo. So, thank you.