Hugo Goudswaard is a photographer and filmmaker and studied at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague. His strength lies in creating captivating films and images that are close to the skin and where painting with light is the essence. His film & photography work is atmospheric, tactile and provocative and has clear tangents to cinematography. He works for a large range of international clients and agencies. "For me, photography is literally painting with light. You start with an empty dark canvas, not a white pallet with dark accents, but with a black canvas where you apply light. Then you fill that in. You show what you want to show. With this you direct the eye of the viewer and with this you tell a story. The starting point for this is that everything around us is black unless there is light on it. A thought that is often more obvious in cinematography than in photography. In combination with telling a story, this makes my work unique.”