Hi there and thanks for visiting my website and, seeing as you've made it to this page too, being curious as to who I am!
Well, I'm Helene Blonsky, aka Lena or Lenochka, as those close to me call me. I was born in London to parents of Greek and Russian descent and we moved to Athens when I was four and, apart from a period of 8 years where I returned to the UK to complete my education, where I have now lived most of my life.
When I was 19 I found myself, unpredictably and to my greatest surprise (and what must have been a fairy godmother's stroke of her magic wand) working on cruise ships and traveling the world for the next 9 years! I took hundreds, if not thousands of photographs over that period, but unfortunately did not possess a decent enough camera, although my little Olympus XA2 suited my needs at the time and I truly adored it!
Quite honestly at the time it never occurred to me to take photography seriously as a career path. I had attended photography club at school where we learnt how to develop our own film and print our own photos in the analogue method. But that's as far as it went. My brother, however, went on to study photography and is now a wonderful professional photographer. It was something my brother did, not me. How could I possibly compete with him and all the other amazing photographers? It just didn't register as a possibility in my brain.
However, I was always artistically inclined. I studied interior design long distance while working on cruise ships and freelanced on residential projects in Greece when I finally left life on ships, settling down to begin my family. Parallel to this I played with creating artwork and designs which I applied to hand knotted rugs, silk scarves and handmade cement tiles. I have also designed websites, logos, posters and other graphics.
Then in 2015 I decided to indulge in my love of photography and in a desire to get off Automatic mode and learn Manual mode I completed the Advanced Photography course with Shaw Academy. Upon doing so I was blessed to receive an incredible gift - a Canon EOS 5d Mark iv camera with a few amazing lenses to boot! My angels must have been listening!
Since then I have practiced playing with various genres and been hired for a few photoshoots, which were amazing fun and very educational for me.
My approach to photography is very similar to my approach to creating art where, besides the technical skills I most enjoy allowing my intuition to lead me. I love natural light, preferring natural settings and lighting as opposed to studio even though outer circumstances can be more unpredictable and naturally not as easy to control and manipulate. But this is where intuition and the excitement of the unpredictable comes in for me. Leaning towards more of an artistic style of photography I can use what might be a negative turning it into a positive to create something different, something a little more expressive, something that shows others how I view the world.
Quite simply, I enjoy taking photographs and pushing the envelope a little more every time, finding ways to express my creativity and world view. Photography helps me observe and see the world and my surroundings in an entirely different and deeper way. It helps me pause and look, feel and.....click.