The Water by Ymke Franssen

The Water. 

I couldn’t imagine a life without the water. I was born in the sea: on land in the Netherlands, that was created by man, where there used to be water. The Netherlands is mostly below sea level, which is why I feel so connected to the water. The Dutch have learned how to guide it and work with it. I’m trying to do the same. 

 

It was natural for me to pick up sailing from my parents who had been doing it their entire lives. Even while we moved around the world, we continued to sail and play in the water. That was the time I picked up a camera to share my experiences and capture the fleeting world of my young mind. When we moved from Dubai to Texas, we went on vacation in South Padre Island, and I surfed for the first time. All you needed was a board and the waves, and I was hooked.

 

When we moved to Florida I started a surf club in my high school, worked together with Surfers for Autism to take photos, saved for an underwater housing by working at a surf shop, and left for Savannah, GA to study photography. I learned new crafts and ways to manipulate photos, and ways to print them using different techniques. I learned to blend these two loves of mine, photography and surfing, to create my own vision of surf culture. 

 

Now I freelance, travel the world, and do what I love most.