Moises Saman blends traditional conflict photography with a deeply personal point of view.  Born in Lima, Peru, from a mixed Spanish and Peruvian family, Saman and his family relocated to Barcelona where he spent most of his youth. He studied Communications and Sociology in the United States at California State University, graduating in 1998. It was during his last year in university that Saman first became interested in becoming a photographer, influenced by the work of a number of photojournalists that had been covering the wars in the Balkans. After completing an internship at Newsday, he spent a month traveling in Kosovo to photograph the immediate aftermath of the last Balkan war.

After becoming a staff photographer at Newsday, Saman spent seven years focused on covering the fallout from the 9/11 attacks, traveling between Afghanistan, Iraq, and other Middle Eastern countries. He left Newsday to become a freelance photographer, contributing to The New York Times, Human Rights Watch, Newsweek, and TIME, among other international publications.

Saman’s work has received awards from the World Press Photo, Pictures of the Year, the Overseas Press Club, and has been shown in several exhibitions worldwide. In 2015, he was given the highly regarded Guggenheim Fellowship for his photojournalism project on the Arab Spring. His book Discordia (2016), presents an unexpected and less straightforward journalistic representation of those years, from the heady days of protest to the disillusionment and violence that followed.For TIME’s prestigious “Person of the Year” issue, Saman was commissioned to photograph 26 journalists in seven countries, including Myanmar, Bangladesh, Russia, Germany, and Mexico.

In 2010, Saman was invited to join Magnum Photos as a Nominee and became a full member in 2014. He is currently based in New York.