Meet Ben Skaar | 20 year old Artist and Student based in New York City..

We had the good fortune of connecting with Ben Skaar and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Ben, how has your perspective on work-life balance evolved over time?
I have found that my work life balance thrives on its own instability. Alongside my photography career, I am a university student in New York City. These two areas of my life demand significant amounts of my energy, but often at different times of the year.

Thus, my energy is diverted to whichever is more pertinent. Nine times out of ten, priority will fall towards my course work to keep good marks and my parents happy. However once I’ve completed what needs to be done on that end, I can hone the rest of my focus on my craft and brand.

I think the word balance implies a stationary state to most people, but I apply it to my own life more as if it were a pendulum. It swings to whatever requires my immediate attention and away from what is less timely, but then swings intensely back to where it left when the time is right. Although this method may be unstable I find it extremely beneficial to be able to focus my entire attention on more isolated tasks at one time.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
I’ve been taking photos since I was 13. First on my smartphone, then on a small camera drone, and eventually on professional mirrorless cameras. I had an innate passion for storytelling and sharing the lens through which I saw the world, and began sharing my images on social media in 2017 when I was 14 years old.

Now online, I began to connect with other creatives and brands, leading to paid work and travel opportunities, which I was endlessly excited by. Two pillars of my life have always been art and adventure, I am thrilled to visit new places and expand my worldview, while also getting to document these experiences through my images. Some brands I have been fortunate enough to work with are DJI, Samsung, KJP, and Visit New Hampshire.

An accomplishment I reflect on was winning Youth Travel Photographer of the Year in 2020; the first international competition I had ever entered. The awarded photos were captured in the Northeastern United States during the autumn season, which I will always uphold as the most magical time of year, with a little Bostonian bias.

People may like the art I make because my approach to photography is less so about capturing what is in front of me and more about how a location makes me feel. I am more concerned with conveying the emotion evoked by a location than how it looked in reality. I use saturated colors and adjust certain elements in my scenes with Photoshop like I’m constructing my own little worlds. Lots of people also dislike my work for these reasons, I’ve been told.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Right now home-base for me is New York City, or as I like to call it, the city where everything happens. I moved here because I felt drawn by its energy I knew that going to school here I could meet a bunch of awesome people in the creative and art fields. Manhattan is drastically different than many of the natural landscapes I share online, but my fascination with the urban jungle shares many traits I find out in the wild as well.

Every visit by a friend brings something different, as I try to adapt the city to them. Like I said, there’s a bit of everything, so I try to tailor the suit. That being said, some of my favorite things to do in the city are visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, people watch in Washington Square Park, grab a slice at Bleecker Street Pizza, take a Citibike ride down the West side Highway, and meander around Soho when the sun is low to the horizon.

Most are cliches, but they are cliches for a reason. I enjoy them.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I would like to shout out my Mom and my Dad for helping to provide me with a creatively fulfilling life and encouraging me to pursue my artistic delusions with caution.

Website: https://www.benskaarphoto.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/feed/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/benskaarphoto

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdNfvnDwutvLsAQdUcgBToA/videos

Image Credits
Personal Photo shot by Ethan Chang (Selmshots)