Tourists Who Shoot

“Tourists Who Shoot” (2009-2012) is a contemporary, nuanced look at how tourists use their cameras while on holiday.

Influenced by the seminal work of photographer Martin Parr, “Tourists Who Shoot” offers a playful glimpse at the sometimes bizarre world of the modern tourist striving to get the perfect shot. It includes an essay by renowned photography scholar Liz Wells and color photographs by Theopisti Stylianou-Lambert.

Before the invention of the portable camera people behaved, moved, and interacted differently. Tourist choreographies have evolved, and are still evolving, alongside changes in camera availability and technology.

Photographer and photography theorist Theopisti Stylianou-Lambert explores tourist landscapes from New York to Cairo as performance spaces where the use of the camera has forced specific choreographies and behaviors upon tourists. With Stylianou-Lambert’s deadpan sense of humor and her unerring eye for the critical detail that brings a photograph to life, “Tourists Who Shoot” is a sometimes humorous, sometimes poignant reassessment of what it means to be a tourist.