About Melika

I didn't start out photographing people — I started out loving stories. Fairytales that felt too big for their pages, films that made a single frame feel like an entire world. At some point I realized a camera could do the same thing for a person standing in front of me: make one moment feel like it belonged in something larger.

That's still what I'm chasing. Whether I'm photographing someone for a headshot they'll use for the next five years, or building an entire imaginative world around them for an afternoon, the question is the same: what does this person look like when they stop performing and just become the most vivid version of themselves?

I work with color, light, and a little bit of theatre. Mostly, though, I work with the belief that you don't need to be anyone other than who you are — you just need someone willing to actually look.