Ben Lee, Photographer & Artist

// Story

When I was a primary school kid, everyday after school, I would rush to the attic of my dad’s architecture firm, and immerse myself in pencil drawing, often times with my elder brother Lawrence.

When we got deeply into our visual creations, I’d noticed something very interesting. I’d get so absorbed, that I felt I was at one with the art itself. I felt the characters on paper coming to life. I felt lightly suspended in air, time dilated, space distorted, tunnel vision and experiences carved deeply in my mind. Most magically, the drawings just appeared on the paper itself; I was merely holding the pencil.

We’d spend much time immersed in our bliss, until my mother’s voice from downstairs broke dreamlike state “guys, time for dinner!”

As a teenager growing up in Canada, I looked back at those experiences as nothing short of magical, as I never experienced anything quite like it again.

Intuitively, I understood those were important moments in my life. I felt so alive, but I downplayed those experiences as “I was just a kid and that’s what kids do, they have fun”.

What I failed to understand was that actually growing up, I forgot how to be a kid. Forgot how to see without the limitations of human constructs and and filters I’ve picked up along the way.

Fast forward to my first summer at McGill University as a business school student, I intuitively picked up my first camera out of the frustration of my dissatisfaction with my side hustle as a student entrepreneur that summer.

On the very first day I got the camera, I went out onto the streets of old Montreal, and without any expectations, start started walking, observing, clicking.

Interestingly, and with immense satisfaction, this photo-walk threw me into the same feeling I had during childhood while drawing.

That feeling I knew was important but never felt after since.

I let all of my energy out on photography that summer. I was hooked.

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Photography consistently brought me into the state of joy, contentment, and peace. I decided to follow my intuition and move to London to pursue photography professionally.

After 15 years of professional photography, it became apparent that operating the camera is only a tiny part in the practice of photography.

Photography is the practice of seeing, thinking, feeling, and most importantly, a practice of being.

The more I practiced, the more I felt a connection to the world. The more I practiced creating, the more creativity there was to be used. The deeper I went with the flow of life, the better I became at accessing that steady, peaceful flow.

By accident, my original commitment to become “technically good” at photography, kicked off a positive cycle of internal observation to sharing that perspective back out to the external world. It is a practice of internal and external alignment, and when in alignment, decisive moments come intuitively. A very blissful way to integrate life and work.

My practice of photography and visual arts at large, is my attempt to capture a slice of my consciousness.

Hope to continually share this process as an artist, and continually to expand and collaborate with the the universe.

— 2024 July 23