Andrejs Grants

Who is Andrejs Grants?

Andrejs Grants is a Latvian photographer and teacher. He studied at the Latvian State University, worked in the “Ogre” photo studio. From 1979 he is a teacher at the House of Technical Innovation in Riga, where he gained his reputation as an influential photography teacher of many Latvian contemporary photographers, film-makers and artists, such as Ritums Ivanovs, Arnis Balcus and Gints Berzins. At "Ogre" photo studio he formed an informal group "A" with photographers Inta Ruka, Valts Kleins and Gvido Kajons. Having influences by documentary photographers, such as Henri Cartier-Bresson and Robert Frank, group "A" used a reportage style to document everyday life of Soviet Latvia, very often creating photographs full of criticism. Andrejs Grants gained international recognition by collaborating with group "A" ideological leader Egons Spuris' widow Inta Ruka. Their project "Latvia: Changing and Unchanging Reality" has been shown internationally. Similar to Ruka's work, Andrejs Grants' main theme are the people in Latvia.