Please enjoy my conversation with Dutch photographer and friend Maurice Vliegen as he tells us all about the Urban Photo Race events he recently participated in.

Bio

Maurice Vliegen (KatMausie as his photo nickname) is a street photographer based in IJsselstein near the centre of the Netherlands. He started as an amateur travel photographer and joined a local photo club to learn by discussing photographs and showing work during club meetings. Within this club there was a small group shooting on the streets and his curiosity of street photography started. "I always liked my candid travel shots of street scenes the most. After I discovered the genre of street photography I saw the similarities between street and travel photography. This was the type of photography I was looking for" he says. Because he was not trained as a photographer, he started doing courses and workshops (with Fokko Muller and Valerie Jardin).

His preferred style of shooting is candid from a close distance which is a challenge because of his height of 6.2 feet. He feels that if he is close to the subject there is more ‘feeling’ in the photos. He searches for humor and out of the ordinary scenes in his work. "I try to show people looking good or get a smile on the viewers face".

To develop more as a street photographer, he looks for challenges and projects to join. Over 2016 until now, he took on a weekly challenge and restricted himself to shoot on the streets with a fixed lens. He also limited himself to his hometown (which is a small city). This resulted in an exposition of local street photography in the library in March/April of 2017.

In May he completed the Urban Photo Race Rotterdam and the Amsterdam edition in June.