Laura El-Tantawy is an award-winning British/Egyptian documentary photographer, bookmaker and educator whose practice explores the human condition through questions of home and belonging. Shaped by a transatlantic life lived between East and West, her work is grounded in social and environmental sensibilities and often weaves stills with moving image, sound and personal narrative.
Born in Worcestershire to Egyptian parents, she studied across Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the US and the UK. She began her career as a newspaper photographer in the United States, then turned freelance in 2005, moving to Cairo and beginning In the Shadow of the Pyramids.



Laura is the first Egyptian recipient of the W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund Award and was nominated for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize. She is also a recipient of Prix Virginia and the PhMuseum Women’s Grant. Her work has been exhibited internationally and featured in The New Yorker, National Geographic, TIME and The New York Times.