Campbell: It's intensely beautiful at the moment. You and I are on the phone right now. Like, you're in LA and I'm in New York right now—this shit is crazy to me. Three years ago my life was going at a steady pace, but in the last two years it's all just skyrocketed in some areas I sort of planned, but the majority of it not so much. I was hoping for this to happen in five or ten years! I'm just trying to be mindful and really enjoy what's on while thinking about the next thing.

Mo: How do you create a space to be present?

Campbell: For me to be present it's all about time. I also have to understand that I can't do everything at the designated time. It's okay for things to be late. It doesn't always work, but I try my best to start my day without any technology. I have a little dog, Wolfgang, who has an Instagram you should check out. [both laughing] He's a beautiful little basenji breed. Hello Mr. was his first shoot! 

Campbell: I kid you not, I'm walking down the street and this girl is looking at me, runs across the street, and goes, “Oh my god, is that Wolfgang?” I'm like, aw shit, my dog's famous! 

Campbell: So I start my day with him because I suffer from mental health issues and working a lot really did impact me, and I just had to create a system that works for me. If I wake up and instantly look at my phone and emails, it's like a sugar rush that leaves me depleted midway through the day. But taking a good half-an-hour to talk to Wolfgang or my partner is something that allows me to prepare for the day. 

Mo: What is your relationship to your work right now compared to two years ago or even when you first started?

Campbell: I feel like two years ago I was organically and reactively creating work because there was so much information that didn't sit right with me. So I would react to that or create work, be it Niijournal, the agency, or imagery where I don't feel like my ideas or my face or my being existed. I believe in Three's heavily and it's been three years since I started taking myself and my work seriously. And in the last three months, my mindset has changed dramatically, because my work the last three years was always in relation to a conflict or a striking in myself to whiteness or white supremacy—not necessarily in the work but in the initial idea. The original idea became a catalyst for the final product. And it's no fault in my own or anyone. 

Campbell: I remember listening to an interview with Toni Morrison, which I'll paraphrase, but she said something along the lines of, “Once you realize your existence out of the context in relation to whiteness, you truly can become free”. I didn't understand it when I first listened to it, but when I took two months off this summer due to health reasons and rewatched the interview, it hit me in a different way where I realized in the last few years that's what I've been doing and it wasn't on purpose. 

Campbell: When I first started shooting a client accidentally forwarded me an email saying I basically couldn't get the job because the person commissioning me didn’t know if I could shoot white people as well as I do black people. So that seeps into your psyche and you carry that with you. I'd wonder, “Am I really a good photographer?” Obviously, these white institutions are just trying to fit a quota, but I created my own space. On one side of that, I know that I am talented but then I'm not thinking freely because I'm thinking of the opposition, which can be white institutions. I shouldn't see them as negative. I just should see them as they are and me as I am. I'll focus on me. 

Campbell: It really did break me in half, however, the ideas started flowing again in the same way they did three years ago, but this time it was fun; it was joyous; it was sad; it was all of the emotions. But there was no correlation to anything and I think that's how my work has changed. I genuinely am on a journey of being free to create as opposed to the feeling of having to create.

Mo: It's not reactive anymore. Having this energy now, are there things you want to challenge yourself towards that you haven't had the chance to before?

Campbell: Yeah, I did Unlocking Seoul before I even started shooting anything as a sort of project to remind myself to look back at this time of freedom. I asked myself, “Do you remember this time when you just took pictures for picture's sake and it wasn't for a deadline or Instagram?” I look back at it and I can remember those feelings, the smells and taste. 

Campbell: So I want to go back on the road and do something like that in the next year. It wouldn't necessarily be fashion imagery or in the studio. It's more reactive, where it's me with a group of people who I've never met before are capturing these initial relations, and making me aware of my surroundings again. I used to carry a camera with me everywhere I went. Now I'm exhausted because I shoot so much. But I want to see where I'm at now because I've grown in skill, technique, and maturity.

Campbell: In the last three years my work has been seen and I'm an avid YouTube watcher, but I thought, “Could I be a YouTuber?” It's all these things where I'm not scared to try things out. But the main thing within my work is I'm delving into the well of Campbell Addy and my 26 years of living and pulling out things. Even if I found that they're mundane, I know that mundanity is sometimes the most relatable thing across people. We all have mundane instances in our lives, and mundane to me might mean something different to someone else. 

Campbell: I'm looking at what I like and want to bring that into that to the forefront. I don't want to compromise what I like because of fear of being inadequate or fear of people not liking it. At the end of the day, if I like it then that's all that matters. It's subjective, you know.

Mo: I was thinking about what you said about bringing your camera with you now, and I've challenged myself to not do that as much so that I can study gestures through someone or light interacting with a scene—whatever’s present and lyrical.

Campbell: Also, the camera has a frame. If you pull it away you can't capture everything. You can't capture the feeling, the smell—sometimes the motion. It's all a learning curve. I don't usually take pictures to inform my imagery. I draw to inform my imagery, but I used to do moving image to inform the image. A lot of my favorite images are when I'm directing models to move, not to be still so that I can capture the right moment. It's a game for me. 

Campbell: I recently went to Japan to take photos and everyone was surprised at the photos because none of the photos featured any people. And if there were people they were faceless or they were reflections of their face—it wasn't a portrait. I challenged myself to find the beauty outside of the face because I was so in awe of people, but we also create everything we see.

Campbell: While cycling around Japan, I found myself looking again. It broke my eye from looking at things at eye level. So now I'm looking up and around like I'm crazy, but now I can explore different and new ideas again. I think every so often you need to reset and attack the work differently to keep it exciting.

Mo: Is there anything in culture or photography you're curious about that hasn't been answered?

Campbell: In fashion, we look to the past to influence the present, yet we love to smudge out the bad that makes us look bad. I understand that me being a photographer is great—all of that is amazing. But the same institutions I'm now working with are the same institutions that didn't work with us within the last 50 years. Where is that article? Where is that interview? I wasn't alive at the time to know what was going on. But in a hundred years, I hope there isn't a cultural and historical smudging of our people, but a history that is told honestly, no matter how badly certain people will come off. We need the truth so the same mistakes aren’t repeated. 

Campbell: How is that in an industry with a spotlight on having these cool, young black photographers no one sees what's going on? Black photographers weren’t born in the late 2000s. We’ve always been here and I hope our forefathers in visual media get the praise they deserve, not just our generation.  

Mo: I have love for Tyler Mitchell’s work but how old is Vogue? Why did it take them that long to get to that place? We've had at least 30 years for that opportunity to be presented to a black photographer. There's a lot of shit overdue in this industry.

Campbell: I always feel like I'm missing the joke. I don't understand what's going on here. And I know I've gone into rooms and places where I have made people feel uncomfortable, but what's that quote about art being uncomfortable?

Mo: “Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.”

Campbell: That's exactly it! I want to talk to these institutions about what made them change. How did this happen so that it doesn't happen again? Just because it's happening now doesn't mean it won't repeat itself.

Mo: Look at the woke capitalism going on. Like you, I'm worried about how long this will happen. How long do we have to shout? If we stop, will we go back to the same place we were at? It's great that we have people like you and Antwuan [Sargent] push narratives forward through your initiatives. If you can encourage a narrative to a large body of people, especially one that's been overdue, then what a world we live in now!

Campbell: That's why we just need to make our mark. I try to be optimistic as possible and the ray of sunshine I want to see in the world. That's it, really. My resolve is that as long as I get to take photos the rest is relative—there isn't an end goal for me. I know some people in our industry—which isn't wrong—want to be number one and want to be at the top if there are charts in our industry. For me, the reason why I have been doing art since I was a kid was because of my woes of life and my mental health. It's a necessity for me. I create ideas out of things that happen to me. 

Campbell: With or without these institutions I will always find a way to create what I need to do to survive. I think despite how the industry will change, some people are like that in all shapes and forms, in writing to photography. One thing history has shown me is that you can't keep us down. I don't know what else you can do to marginalize a group of people for them to still be killing it. History just shows you what a powerful bunch of people we are.

Campbell: So in two years no one may want me to shoot for their magazines, but at the end of the day I'll still create the artwork. It's not for them, it's for me. I think that is something that keeps me smiling and excited to be here; that energy is emulated around my friends. The gracefulness and humility we hold is something no one can take from us regardless of where the industry is. If it's being forced into wokeness, then force yourself into wokeness. That's none of my business. I'll take that check and go home, thank you. [both laughing] 

Campbell: They know what's up. We know what's up. Nothing is fine, and I'm not here to force anyone to do something they don't want to do. I'm not going to scream at them and ask, “Why aren't you doing it?” I learned that the hard way. That doesn't do anything. But what I will do is show you from example is that it's okay to be authentically you and nice. We live in a world full of kindness and love. And if that's not what you want to do then I guess you're not for me and that's totally fine. But time will tell that, that way of thinking will kill you slowly.

Campbell: Niijournal is here to educate not irritate. It's not anything to do with my feelings. I'm just here to show facts of facts.

Mo: Speaking of Niijournal, what has been an unexpected result of this pursuit?

Campbell: The most unexpected result was traveling the world as a photographer and seeing black people that I have never met before saying that they love it. Getting emails from anonymous people telling me how I've helped them go through things... I was on set shooting the Teen Vogue covers in LA and I've never met Lizzo or her team before. Her team was literally like, “I fuck with Niijournal.” Mind you, Niijournal isn't even stocked in LA. And I was like, what? This was my first time being in LA! People think I act so weird but it genuinely blows my mind because it was a little thing that I did in my house summers ago. I thought no one was going to buy it—it's just a cute stupid project and I'll move on.

Campbell: There are no words that can describe the feeling of feeling connected to people that you don't know in a very positive way. My little ideas from a small town boy were sent across the globe and it inspired someone to think, “I can do this.” It gave them hope and when I created it, it was because I didn't have that hope.

Campbell: Till this day it still shocks me. I've had ex-Jehovah Witnesses email me saying that they haven't spoken about their trauma for 40 years. It just shocks me because I'm just living my life trying to turn my negatives into positives. If it's one person or two-hundred-million, it's still a positive change.

Mo: If you were to talk to 13-year-old Campbell, what would he be most surprised about and least surprised about?

Campbell: He'll be surprised that, one, I work hard. [both laughing] He'll be surprised that I actually put 100-percent into my work because I never used to. I always had a fear of trying which is weird.

Mo: Were you afraid of the possibility of success or failure?

Campbell: I was just afraid of the possibility that people would actually get to know who I am. I was always living a double life growing up gay in a Jehovah Witness household. I had many different faces so I had this inundated fear of being found out. Found out about what? I didn't know what that "what" was. I was always making myself small.

Mo: Did your family know about your sexuality?

Campbell: They didn't know until I left home when I was 17. 

Campbell: But at 13, I think I would be surprised by my relationship with myself physically and my relationship with others, especially my mom. I think it's the confidence I have to strive to be my most authentic self. 13-year-old me wouldn't even understand what that meant because I didn't have a sense of self. But he wouldn't be surprised that I'm doing something artistic. It’s just the fact that I never thought it would be a job in all honesty. I thought I'd probably do it as a hobby or during the summer holidays. And he wouldn't be surprised that I haven't changed in other ways, like when I put a video on Instagram, some of my old school friends would say, “You haven't changed one bit.”

Mo: What do you feel is something you're trying to embed for future Campbell?

Campbell: I would hope that in 10 years that I start the seeds or have started a family to pass on the knowledge I'm gaining. And I would hope to have some sort of empire; whatever size it is is not the point. I would love to be a good example to my children or little sisters or nieces and nephews—to show them someone who is self-made but also happy at where they're at. I don't want to be the uncle that's always like, “You have to do better.” Put everything you can into it and be happy with what you're doing. I also hope that I can have one film under my name, and have the same fire that I have now to create.

Mo: Do you feel like that's injected in the purpose of your work? If not, then what is the purpose of your work?

Campbell: I think that it is injected, especially the whole passing down to the next generation. I have a little sister, Francine, who's 16 years younger and she's always in the back of my head when I'm creating work. I don't ever want her to question or be embarrassed by what I do. And I think that's the same thing for my children in the future.