Sandra Zarneshan is an Italian-Iranian photographer interested in visual arts and urban landscape.

With a master degree in Political Science, she worked as PhD tutor in the university and as chief operating officer in the corporate sector before focusing on photography.

As an artist, Sandra’s visual narrative aims to describe the relationship between what is visible to the eye and what is supposed to be, the surrounding space giving context to the connection allying expectations and reality. She believes that within the concepts of roots and belonging there is a universal meaning, archetypes that point us to an investigation of shapes and spaces that become alive.

Between 2015 and 2018 she worked as sponsor photographer for Dubai International Film Festival, contributor for Compasses magazine and staff photographer for Luxe by AirBnB.

In 2016 she attended the summer masterclass in ‘Visual Storytelling in the Digital Age’ at ICP (International Center of Photography New York) and several Magnum workshops on visual narrative and editing in 2016.

She was part of the mentorship program with Warehouse421 (Abu Dhabi) and Gulf Photo Plus (Dubai) in 2020 and  became a new member of Women Photograph in 2021.

Her work has been shown in collective exhibitions “Vantage Point” 2015-2017 at Sharjah Art Foundation, “No Place Like Home” and “Arab Streets Vol. II” at Gulf Photo Plus in 2018 (Dubai), “Portraits of Humanity” as winner for the world tour in 2019, “Mina Zayed: reflections on past future” at Warehouse421 in 2020 (Abu Dhabi); also in the collective books “Spectrum” by HIP Hotels (2016) and “Portraits of Humanity” by British Journal of Photography (2019).

Born and raised in Pescara – a beach town on the South-east cost of Italy – she briefly worked in Bruxelles and Milan before landing in Dubai, where she still lives since 2009 and works free lance as architecture, interiors and events photographer.