Ghanaian-American filmmaker, photographer and creative director Joshua Kissi, whose work celebrates the vibrance of underrepresented communities through a cultural and historical lens, has joined division7 for worldwide representation.
Raised in the Bronx, NY, Kissi grew up with an affinity for the arts despite the lack of exposure and accessibility to creative industries. He began his journey as the co-founder of Street Etiquette, a blog documenting men’s style with a focus on Black men that became an online sensation with a large following. Street Etiquette was featured in magazines such as GQ, Complex, Essence and Fantastic Man. The New York Times published an article, “ Serious About Cool” documenting Street Etiquette’s cultural success.
While Kissi found meteoric success with Street Etiquette, filmmaking and photography were always his first love and passion. He picked up his first camera at the age of 17, and since then he has used his talent as an artist to empower communities of color while humanizing them and diminishing stereotypes and prejudices in the images he creates.
His triumphant films and photographs tell stories that are often unrecorded with intentionality, respect and care. His work is soulful, distinctive and emotive, representing a truly unique view on humanity and the world. He’s worked with a diverse list of clients including Beats by Dre, Nike, Google, NYT Style Magazine, InStyle, Vogue, and the New York Times Op Docs, to name a few.
“Joshua is perfection. Looking through his body of work, one cannot help but be moved viscerally. We couldn’t be more excited for him to be joining the division7 family,” said Kamila Prokop, who is co-managing director of division7 along with David Richards.
Kissi is also the co-founder of See in Black, a collective of 80 Black photographers with the mission of elevating Black visibility, and TONL, a company transforming stock photography to reflect the diverse people and narratives that are overlooked in traditional media today.
Kissi, who’s been featured as Inc. Magazine’s “30 under 30” for his work, observed, “Storytelling has always moved me to think grander, larger and more in depth about the world we’re presented. Telling stories from behind the lens is like capturing a sense of who a person is at their core and that alone is a privilege. We do not own stories, people or ideas, we simply have the liberty and privilege of sharing them. I hope to tell more narratives that break down walls and build more bridges. It is an absolute pleasure to be joining the division7 team alongside a talented roster of not just filmmakers but world changers in their own way. “
The Gardening.club. Grows AI Talent Roster
The Gardening.club., the sister company to production house The Sweetshop, has assembled a lineup of eight new artificial intelligence (AI) artists. The ensemble of talent looks to redefine storytelling by fusing cutting-edge AI with human creativity. The Gardening.club.’s guiding rule is that AI is never just a substitute; it must enhance and expand creative vision.
The fresh cohort of AI artists will bring an extra dimension to the work already championed by futurist Tomas Roope, co-founder of The Gardening.club, along with AI artist and co-founder Jacqui Kenny whose collaborative projects with brands like Gucci, Google, OpenAI and Louis Vuitton have impacted both the art and commercial worlds.
Melanie Bridge, co-founder and CEO of The Sweetshop and co-Founder of The Gardening.club,, said, “We’ve made it our mission to unearth the world’s top AI artists—it was a mandate for us that each would be a brilliant storyteller with a unique voice. It was also crucial that their body of work demonstrated not only artistic vision but would seamlessly translate into the commercial world. It’s not common to see this level of mastery in AI artistry, and we believe our roster of eight represents the very best out there today.
Bridge continued, “We have also been working hard with copyright lawyers worldwide to develop a comprehensive system of protocols, that ensure we can confidently use AI in our commercial projects--we are very proud of this and believe it to be an industry first.”
Joining The Gardening.club are a group of talented artists who have already made waves as storytellers in the AI art world--Kenny, Floam World, Nathan Boey, Ethereal Moon, Junie Lau, Aashay Singh, YZA Voku, and KEZIAI. These artists’ backgrounds are... Read More