Quetzal Maucci
College
London College of Communication
Person Type
Alumni
Biography
Quetzal completed MA Photojournalism and Documentary Photography in 2020. Quetzal is a Senior Lecturer in Photography at Kingston School of Art and a freelance photographer.
Interview
You graduated from MA Photojournalism and Documentary Photography in 2020. What was the most important learning you took from the course?
It is always hard to reduce a whole experience to one learning. There were many important learnings from tutors, classmates, and guest lecturers. Critical writing, long-form storytelling, and social justice became ever more present in my process and work. Writing, especially, has become closer to me. It was also through this process that I remembered how important the community you create around you and the support you find can be, especially when making vulnerable work.
Before MAPJD, I created work that stemmed from personal experience but did not explore my own specific personal experience. I remember Morag Livingstone saying in class one day, when I was talking about choosing to explore a project about meeting my father for the first time, that this was the place where I would have support and people to lean on through this process. She also reminded me that, in order to be able to make other work, it was important to work through this experience as well. In short, my experience at MAPJD helped me to continue to build a community, stay open to experimenting with new ways of researching and working, read more, converse about my work, and question and continue questioning.
What was a highlight from your time at LCC?
Meeting all the tutors and classmates. Some classmates became close friends and are people I still share my work with. It can be difficult to come out of a structured learning environment and find a community to share work with, and so I value and am grateful for the classmates I had and those who I am still regularly in contact with. As for the tutors, their insights, their experiences, and their ways of researching, writing, and questioning have stayed with me all these years. I still lean on them for support, whether it is asking questions about contracts, asking for a reference, or seeking advice on projects. I cannot thank them enough for their support. Last year, it was a joy to be selected by a jury to take part in the Welcome Table event at Peckham 24, facilitated by Becky Warnock and in conversation with Sabine Hess.
It felt like a full-circle moment, coming back together after Becky had taught me important ideas around ethics, listening, collaboration, and how the process and care involved in working with people within a project can be just as important as the project itself.I always say to the students I teach: you might not know who people are or where people will end up, so be kind to one another. One day, you might end up collaborating with a classmate, a tutor, someone you meet in portfolio reviews, or someone you meet in passing. The photography field is small, and there should be more support for one another in this industry than there currently is.
How did your major project help you when you graduated?
My major project, Piccoli Baci, began from this experience of meeting my father for the first time when I was 23 years old and explores the complexities of family, absence, and belonging. On a personal note, the work opened up a life-changing event for me: meeting family members who didn’t know I existed and whom I am still getting to know over these past few years. This has become part of the project now, and so it has opened up a new chapter. On a professional note, it has opened the door to creating more long-form work that is rooted in personal experience.
Unfortunately, however, we didn’t have a final exhibition due to the pandemic, which was heartbreaking for our cohort, and so a few of us created our own exhibition at Four Corners Gallery. To this day, I still look back and feel sadness that we couldn’t come together as a whole class to exhibit our final projects. It would have been an important closure to such a challenging year. However, I am grateful and proud of the exhibition that we built together.
That experience also encouraged me to submit the work to awards and opportunities. The dummy book for Piccoli Baci was shortlisted for the PhotoLux Festival Dummy Book Award in 2022 and was exhibited in Lucca, Italy, and Arles, France. The work was also published in Fraction Magazine in 2024, shortlisted for Belfast Photo Festival in 2024, nominated for the Star Photobook Award in 2023, and shortlisted for the Images Vevey Book Award in 2021.
You are now Senior Lecturer in Photography at Kingston School of Art and a freelance photographer. Can you tell us more about your role?
I never imagined myself teaching, but four years ago I was recommended for this job and found myself applying and being hired. For many years, I freelanced as a photographer in an array of roles (photography assistant, picture editor, studio assistant, picture researcher, technician, etc.), working with publications and organisations including Time Magazine, The New York Times, The Financial Times, Der Spiegel, Die Zeit, Greenpeace, and Amnesty International.
I enjoy freelancing, but it can be difficult to balance, and I now find that teaching part-time alongside freelancing is the best balance for me. Looking back, I am so grateful for this position because it has changed my life. I enjoy teaching enormously and find joy in working with students, supporting them in finding what they want to focus on and share with the world, while also having the opportunity to explore my own research within the field, which in turn supports my practice.
What’s the most exciting or fulfilling aspect of your current work?
The process of exploring, listening, storytelling, and writing!
Have you won any awards or residencies or grants since leaving the course?
In 2024, my recent personal work, By The Time She Grows Up, which explores my experience of growing up in a queer family and interweaves my mothers’ migration journey to the U.S. with the complex political climate of the 1990s, was published in Time Magazine.
The work was also showcased in the Queer Havens exhibition by World Press Photo and Pride Photo in the Netherlands in 2025, and was part of a travelling outdoor exhibition across the Netherlands, organised by Pride Photo, in 2024. In 2025, I was shortlisted for the Women by Women Photo Vogue Award, co-facilitated a Barbican workshop on poetry, photography, and the relationship between text and image alongside poet and writer Taylor Beidler, and spoke at the Welcome Table event, facilitated by Becky Warnock, as part of Peckham 24.
In recent years, I have also received two Research Support Grants and an Early Career Researcher Grant from Kingston University, been nominated for the Star Photobook Award, and been shortlisted for both the Jerwood/Photoworks Award and the Images Vevey Book Award. My work has also been recognised as a finalist by Open Walls (British Journal of Photography), the Hellerau Portraiture Exhibition, Source Magazine, and Photo Fringe.
What are you currently working on?
To be honest, at the moment I am letting my work stew while I spend some time exploring my writing.
Image credit: Quetzal Maucci