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Ian Spanier

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Born in Connecticut and raised in Westchester, New York, Ian Spanier has had a lifelong interest in photography — since age 6, to be specific, when his parents gave him his first camera: a Kodak Disc. For two decades after, Ian did everything he could not to become a photographer — yet he somehow always found himself with camera in hand, composing pictures and telling stories. In college, Ian majored in art and psychology, and his first career aspiration was to work in sports medicine as a trainer for a professional team. Even after he abandoned that plan in favor of photography, though, he spent much more of his time on the back end — as a magazine photo editor, assigning and organizing shoots rather than creating images himself. As the years passed, though, he found himself increasingly in the field and not behind a desk — and realized, however circuitously, that he had found his true calling after all. These days, as comfortable hanging off the edge of a cliff as he is in the studio, Ian’s happy to go to just about any length to get the shot. He has long said that his brain doesn’t really have a “fear switch,” but there was always one exception: sharks. Not wanting to self- impose professional limitations, however, several years ago Ian took it upon himself to go to South Africa, submerge himself in a protective cage and go face-to-face with the Great White. This episode seems to have cured him of his phobia — a result perhaps psychology-major Ian could have shed some light on back in college. Ian lives in Los Angeles full time now, and is available for assignments in New York, California . . . and anyplace else that’s accessible by plane, train, car, horse, dune buggy, bungee cord, camel or mule. If it can be reached by legs, hooves, hooks, wheels or wings, it’s fair game for an Ian Spanier shoot.