Gray King Studio — photographer and designer, Moscow

I am 36, and for almost ten years I have been building stories through visual communication.

My path began with graphic design and identity: I did projects for Forbes, MTS, 1C, Avito and Yandex. Before that I worked in the restaurant industry, but I understood fairly quickly that I did not want to be merely a go-between for ideas and the way they are made real — I wanted to be the one who creates. For a while I tried tattooing, and then the pandemic unexpectedly turned me towards digital illustration. That is how my design studio came about.

Photography had been growing in me alongside all of it. In 2024 I finally stopped putting it off and gave myself to it completely. Back in my first year I heard a phrase that changed the way I see: “Photography is writing with light.” That is how my Telegram channel “Tracery of Light” came about.

Since then my work has made a magazine cover and won a number of photography awards. Today I shoot for private clients and models, but my aim is to work with brands and the fashion industry. What I offer is not just images: it is the ability to build a whole visual narrative, from the first spark of an idea to the finest detail.