About

I have wandered the world. There were the fifteen years spent living lives in Turkey, Belgium, England, Switzerland and Italy, with my photography career gifting me so many holy moments. Moments so beautiful that they are often difficult to describe.

I photographed exquisite weddings and events all over Europe.

Berlin. Photographing that Hungarian band, while standing on a table (for safety), as the room exploded with people from all over the world, dancing & celebrating a wedding.

Cairo. On assignment, living in a local section of the city, following a local artist, being introduced to locals … woven into the fabric of that immense and exotic city; a magical moment in time.

Madrid. Kathleen, the Soprano singer, and her marriage to the Spaniard. A magnificent wedding.

Flanders Fields. So many years spent photographing all manner of events out on Flanders Fields. Commemorations, freelancing for newspapers and magazines around the world. Clients included New Zealand film director, Peter Jackson, the NZ Defence Forces, and the British Army. I took 1,000s of photographs out on Flanders Fields, with the city of Mesen hosting a photography exhibition of my work. An opportunity I promptly shared with a Belgian photographer who was creating beautifully stitched images from the area.

A behind-the-scenes note: It was a photography exhibition where, in pursuit of those exhibition images, I may have consumed two rather full glasses of undiluted whiskey, starting at 10am, while trying to keep up with the very hospitable 80+ year old Bugler … who shall remain nameless. Let’s just say, he had had more practice than me but I didn’t disgrace myself. I did get the required photographs. He was scolded by the Belgian historians I counted as friends, meanwhile I was teased forever after by those same friends.

Stavanger. Teaching introductory photography to 2 teenage girls. I returned another time, to photograph a wedding so full of love that quiet tears slid down my face, during the groom’s speech and despite understanding no Norwegian.

I returned to New Zealand, full of so many exquisitely joy-filled stories, having met so many special people, during all those years spent wandering in places like Salamanca, Gallipoli, Istanbul, Ankara, Fredericksberg, New York and Madison Ohio, Rarotonga, France, Italy, Holland, Germany, … so many places, so many stories.

And so… 2018 found me flying home to New Zealand. I moved in with Dad, and his Dementia. I was on a different kind of steep learning curve as he slipped into forgetting and anxiety, and I was left trying to learn, as quickly as was possible, that he looked the same, seemed the same but he wasn’t the same. Finally, after almost one year, there was a midnight ambulance run … with Dad in congestive heart failure. On the other side of his hospital stay, he agreed to two weeks of respite care in a lovely local rest-home and then chose to stay on.

I found a summer job down in Fiordland, located on the south-west corner of New Zealand, and really began to ‘return’ from Europe. Slowly I rediscovered/remembered old loves; like the beautiful earthy wet smell of Manapouri’s water and glacial rockscapes, and the over-powering intensity of Manuka and Beech forests. I was slowly grounded, in place, driving through the breath-taking landscapes that are the norm here. It was no longer my 2,000 old Italian cityscape but it was powerful, in the way Nature can be powerful.

Recently I began exploring again, and fell hard for a small town called Arrowtown, and the wine-rich valley called Gibbston Valley. I have fallen in love with a Pinot Noir called China Terrace, the 2017 harvest. And I have had to rethink all I imagined I knew about NZ’s red wine, prior to leaving New Zealand, back in 2003.

2020, the year of so much, and here I am, a professional photographer relaunching photography workshops for New Zealand women. Workshops previously run in Belgium, Norway and Italy. This is a passion of mine … introducing women to the way that their cameras work but, more importantly, inviting them to understand and own their unique ways of seeing and capturing the world.

I strongly believe that there is no right or wrong in photography.  There is simply your way of seeing.  And once you understand that, own it, then the world simply opens up to you in new ways.

A workshop client, back in Italy,wrote of my photography workshop:

Not only has Di changed my perception of the city I have called home for the past six years, she has also taken me beyond my own limits as a photographer. She has inspired me to stop living my entire life on the default settings I have grown so comfortable with. By pushing a camera to its limits and learning how to manipulate the manual settings, I, for the first time in my life, realized how much potential I was wasting by always deferring to my default auto setting.

Leah  wrote about her experience with me, over in Holiday Mag.

In reassuring news, if you want to read of clients who keep in touch with me … a couple of years later, and I was Leah’s flatmate, living on top of the hill, above Portofino, in Italy.

But enough from me. I will leave you with the words of a handful of my clients.

Client Praise …

WOW!!!! Three days later and I am still buzzing from Di’s photography workshop. Learned so much about how to use my camera settings to really get the picture I want. Finally I understand how my camera works and how to get the best out of it. Di has made it so easy. I love the way she is able to explain the technical terms in an easy to understand manner and quickly takes you on to practice the learned. Her workbook is proving to be such a valuable resource to go back to again and again. Thank you Di for a wonderful day of learning, discovering and taking my passion to the next level. 

Ellen Carlson, Certified Life Coach.

The photography lessons fluidly led from detailed descriptions to anecdotes and to stories of Genova. Somehow I think I’ll always think of Genova and my new friends when I use my camera now, and I like that very much. While my Nikon D3200 hadn’t really budged from the automatic setting in the last year since I bought it, Di helped me break out and feel confident shooting in Aperture Priority and Shutter Priority modes.

At first, it all seemed a blur of ISO, F-stops and trying to sort out what aperture numbers really meant. But by Sunday afternoon something happened. We were taking photos of the fountain in Piazza de Ferrari and it all came together. Suddenly I could control the settings on my camera to make the spouts of water long and smooth or stop the action where it felt you could see the drops of water. Just by turning a dial. And it worked. And it made sense. Helen was sitting serenely on the side of the fountain and can attest to the fact that I resisted jumping up and down again. But just barely. My camera, I am pleased to say, has only been back to the Automatic setting a few times since I’ve returned. I’ve still got so much to learn, but after only a weekend with Di I feel like I am on my way.

Laura Thayer, Writer, Blogger Ciao Amalfi.

Before we met in Genoa for a weekend's photography course, Di sent me a workbook with exercises. I thought that was very helpful. I learned a lot about the functions of the camera and after studying it I understood much better how I can learn to take better pics. During the practical session in Genoa, we took tons of photos and analysed them afterwards. I got over my fear of technology!

Outi Maattanen, Journalist/Writer.

... and the number of times I had the instruction book out could have been embarrassing but it wasn’t. It was FUN, huge fun, I got to fiddle about with f-stops, and shutter speeds, depth of field, and ISO it was like remembering a lost language.

The main thing I discovered with A New Way of Seeing is that I have so much more to learn. That photography is an integral part of my language and it’s one I love sharing with you.

Lisa Chiodo, from Renovating Italy

I had the privilege of joining a Di Mackey photography group workshop for the day on a Sunday. I needed insight and guidance to get me through a ‘wall’ that I had found a little impenetrable between my camera and myself. 
Frustrated with photos that didn’t turn out to be what ‘I saw’ and envisaged, I needed to learn about the basics of my camera.
Di took me individually from the point of using my own camera . Covering make and style perspective, she sourced the information for me that she knew I would need and I had a most rewarding day learning about shutter speeds, using aperture and investigating what style of photography I was individually drawn towards . She balanced and blended time well between all in the group. 
It was a rewarding day for me of tips and techniques that immediately lifted my photos to a level I am now working on with enthusiasm and delight.
Thank you for a wonderful day of information,, new connections with a common interest, a delicious lunch and wander through that has opened me to kindle and connect with a passion my journey and stories from hereon through.

Lynette Day, Chef & Explorer of the World, Brussels.

Di was able to explain the finer points of photography in a way I could understand and apply. Di supported me in applying my new skills and we critiqued the results together, discussing why the photo looked as it did and what I might do to improve this.

Julie Madgwick, Jules Hikoi.

Commercial Clients

Di interjects … Photography has swept me up and into a life full of the most marvelous adventures.  I spent 3 months living in Berlin, working as sole photographer for a huge international exhibition.

The curator of Berlin’s TASWIR exhibition wrote:

Any time I raise anything on stage, I ask Di Mackey to join the project. Her photographic work is magnificent and I love her presence: her portraits are stunning, they expose intimacy, humor, and pensiveness; her photographs capture the space, the movement, human interaction deliciously, in a way that one feels invited to an event long after it disappeared from the public scene.

In all her unobtrusiveness when working with the camera, Di is great fun to hang out with, the artists, scholars, thinkers, curators of our big Berlin exhibition highly appreciated her, and when working together in Cairo, Istanbul, Berlin, or wherever else, I enjoy her kindness, humor, and delightful presence. 

I miss her at the time when we are “in between projects.”  One of the first things I will do when starting a huge new project is to ask Di Mackey whether she wants to do the photographic work.  I hope she will.

Shulamit Bruckstein, curator, director of TASWIR projects / ha’atelier. Berlin.

I call Di when I needed some pictures of me and my interiors for my business. I have always considered myself to be good at taking pictures and to have a good artistic “eye” so I first tried to do everything myself… with lots of disappointment. 
What a difference it makes to work with a professional photographer! 
Di’s pictures are not only beautiful; they capture the spirit of a moment or in my case, the essence of a person. I don’t know how she does it: somehow she gets invisible so that you don’t have to pose or to pretend to be different from what you are. Then, she captures your authentic self! The result is that my professional portraits are different from the usual “business pictures”, they are true and vibrant and are exactly what I was imagining.

Francesca Puccio - Director at STANDING RENOVATION

What I really got out of our time together is a deeper relationship with my camera - in the past I think I've always considered my good shots to be lucky shots and haven't felt like I had much control over the outcome. Our time together, learning how to play with the ISO, exposure compensation and using bracketing (often heard about but never knew what it was) has meant that I'm taking photos that, when I look at them, my first thought isn't 'oh I'll fix that in Lightroom'.  They are rich and colorful.

Diny Naus, Early Childhood Learning Support Coordinator, Hong Kong.

Clients

To give you an idea of how some of my work and I are perceived, I'll leave you with the words that others have written of me because, in the end, that is the simplest way ...

The disk arrived 4 days ago and I still can’t get my head around the amazing amount of information, details, memories and emotion that you have captured and generated! The pictures are simply amazing, you have an exquisite gift for creating such intimate portraits that are completely natural and utterly captivating. I cannot thank you enough for the photos that have formed such a critical record of what really was one of the highlights of my life. 
Garry Brown, MD and Parent, Event Photo Series. Seraphim Choir Tour, Belgium

Working with Di is a pleasure from start to finish. Her love of people and passion for art and communication translates to an experience where those in front of the camera are as relaxed and happy with the photography process and results as the one behind it. 
Veronica McCabe Deschambault, Family Portrait client. Freelance Writer/Communications Professional.

I am an opera singer and an amateur photographer. I have been surrounded by photographers (both amateur and professional) for most of my life and I can say, without any hesitation, that Di is the best photographer I've worked with. 
Di is professional and friendly throughout the whole process. A wonderful human being who is truly interested in her subjects and what they are about. She uses that knowledge to inspire and inform her photography. 
Di's photos are just plain wonderful. Beautiful. Alive. Truly capturing the moment (I know it's cliché, but in her case, it's true). Her photographer's eye is just... incredible. Wonderful. Awe inspiring. How she see things that we witness only in passing and captures it to its fullest depth is astounding. 
I give her my highest recommendation. Period. She is superlative. 
Peter Gage Furlong, Tenor. Professional Portrait Client, Berlin.

Di è riuscita a catturare in un paio d'ore tutto quello che rende ciascuno di noi unico e speciale. Con la sua presenza discreta e tanta naturalezza ci ha messo subito a nostro agio e la sessione fotografica è stata un'esperienza piacevole e divertente anche per i bambini. E che dire del risultato? Decisamente al di sopra di ogni aspettativa: foto bellissime, originali, divertenti, commoventi e tanto, tanto speciali. 
Paola Ottonello, Portrait Client, Italy.

Stunning is the word I've been thinking when I saw what she did. The way she is capturing details, moods, the vibes of the moment. A very talented lady. And discreet too when working, good listener and good observer and very prompt to finish the job too. So what more can one want?

Fort impressionée par le résultat de son travail et la façon dont elle le réalise, très recommandable.

Heel professioneel, afgewerkt, haar foto's vertellen een verhaal. Indrukwekkend, keer op keer. 
Dominique, Author and Historian, Belgium.

Compelling, engaging, vibrant, sensual...Di's ability to translate a sense of person and of place through her photography is remarkable. Her images permeate the beholder and have this way of coming to feel like old friends when you revisit them (which you will). That is quite difficult to do in this age when everyone with an iPhone fancies themselves a photographer. But one has only to view the world through Di's eye to know that she is the real deal.
Laura Young, Coach & Truly Extraordinary Soul.