By Michel Verhoef
My photography tries to communicate emotion. Some of my images may be classified as art photography, while some may be seen as a documentary or a crossover between both. I usually want to capture an emotion within our daily lives that is laying a bit deeper, or very deep, or a just-below-the-surface.
You may see my love for the old-style photographers in my work: the Bressons, the Friedlanders, the Parrs or even a Norman Rockwell could be hidden in there. Just to name a few. The Dutch photographer Erwin Olaf is also a great inspiration.
Essentially I want to keep the scene as original as possible without changing it by copying or adding in information from other pictures. The basic mood of a picture has to be already in the picture through the real-life content of the scene. I just need to enhance my images by dodging and burning to emphasize the feeling and to guide the viewer’s eye. Every picture needs to tell a story, preferably through an interaction between people or between people and their environment. In most cases my subjects are people who demand a quick response from the camera’s shutter and sometimes a lot of patience is required to get people used to that lingering-guy-with-a-camera.
Child in time
Hot but stylish
Immigration
Dorana Alberti
But I want to stay
Garçon s’il vous plait
Everlasting pose
Strings
Beach confession
Happy days are here again
One child policy
Oxygen
It takes two
Tango mirrored
Tango
Michel Verhoef was born in Germany and immigrated to the Netherlands at age nine. His father was a Dutch jazz musician and his mother a German housewife. Verhoef started at about that young age to make his first pictures with a Brownie that he got from his mother. From her he inherited his feeling for the visual art photography. It has always, though, stayed a hobby besides his actual job as a housing engineer.
Website: http://michel-verhoef.artistwebsites.com/
Michel’s Recommended/Interesting Links:
Magnum Photos–The Changing of a Myth
Creative Thresholds 
Fantastic!
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Thanks a lot Ashly !
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Thanks for selecting and putting my work up here Melissa, it’s an honor to be featured 🙂
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It’s an honor to have it here, Michel!! Thank YOU! 🙂
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These make me want to write fiction. So moving!
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Thanks for being an inspiration !!
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Michel is a sensitive and unique photographer. One of the best. And although I have never seen him working in person, I am pretty sure he must wear a cloak that renders him invisible! How else to get so many amazing shots? 😉
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Thanks Colleen for wanting to use my cloak…it would suit you nice too I am sure 😉
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