In this promotional monologue, Zaakirah Muhammad introduces herself as a portrait photographer and explains the meaning behind her name and her business brand, Nyar. She articulates her artistic vision: capturing natural, candid expressions that reveal a subject’s personality and essence. Zaakirah emphasizes her love for travel, children, and meeting new people, recounting a memorable shoot in Ghana where she photographed schoolchildren during a timeout, which received strong feedback for its emotive facial expressions. She describes her studio environment as a relaxed, music‑filled space where she connects with subjects, aiming to make the session fun and reflective. Influences such as Derek Blanks, Jeremy Cowart, and Mark Liddell are cited for their portrait work. Throughout, she positions herself as an easy‑going, attentive listener whose personality shapes the photographic experience.
Chapters
In 2 years, I see myself being the portrait photographer of maybe well-known people, musicians, people with character, people with personalities, just capturing the essence of their personality. My name is Zaakirah Muhammad, and I am a portrait photographer. My first name means the hereafter. My middle name, which is Nyar, means illuminous, and that's the name I decided to use for my photography business. I photograph people. You know, I like to catch people in action, candidly, you know, in their elements. A natural expression, natural smile, natural laugh. Beauty is natural. That's what I go by. I decided to use Nyar because it's a name that was easy to pronounce and the meaning is unique, and I just felt like to incorporate that into my style of photography. I love traveling, so I definitely want to incorporate that as often as possible. I love traveling, I love children, I love, you know, meeting new people, and Just giving back. When I went to Ghana, it was my first time really just taking my camera with me and using the tools that I know and just photographing, just photographing everywhere I went and everything that I did and all the people I met. And there's this one particular photograph that I have gotten a lot of feedback from, and it's of children. They were elementary school, kindergarten, I believe. And they were— it was a day of timeout. They were supposed to be on timeout because they had been bad and the teacher was just sick of them. So I was the teacher sitting for the day and I was like, can I take photos of them? And so I just went around the room and just photographed children. They sat in like rows of 5 everywhere. So there was this one particular group of children and they just posed for me. And she said, those facial expressions were What makes that photo? When I am in the studio photographing and after everything has been set up and it's just me and the subject, I just feel like I'm in my element. You know, there's— most of the time there's music going and, you know, I'm in my happy place. You know, for most people to kind of go away for someplace, I'm right there. You know, just me and the subject and, you know, I'm trying to have some fun and just capture emotion, capture their beauty, capture their personality. I don't have one favorite, but just to name a few, I do like the work of Derek Blanks. I like the work of Jeremy Cowart and Mark Liddell. You know, most of them are portrait photographers. Some of them have, you know, experience in fashion and advertising and things like that, but I just like the way their style is. I want people to know that I am an easygoing, laid-back person. Understanding, a good listener, and all that comes out in the photo. Just to know that as the shoot goes on, it'll be a fun experience. A fun experience of getting to know yourself in a way you never have and just having fun.
