AM Vikki, you have photographs from various other countries and cultures. Have you always traveled abroad? How many countries have you visited?

VL When I was a teenager, I started traveling abroad with my father. I didn't take photographs then, but the wanderlust and the excitement of being in a new place, seeing new things and meeting new people stayed with me. I've visited London, Paris, Hong Kong, China (Guilin, Guangzhou and Shenzhen to be exact), Macau, South Africa, Mexico and Canada.

AM Have you taken your daughter on any of your international trips yet?

VL The only country I've taken my daughter to was Canada. I've been planning to take her to Hong Kong since she was born, but something has always come up to postpone our trip. We're planning on going to Mexico in the next few months.

AM How have you found your reception as an American photographer?

VL In Hong Kong, I used a medium-format camera, which looks quite different than a regular 35mm camera. I had people stopping me to look at my camera and, since it is more discreet than a 35mm camera, didn't encounter too many problems with photographing street life. One incident that stands out in my mind is being in the Cat Street Market in Hong Kong and focusing my camera on 2 men working with wood. They jumped up and started screaming at me, pointing to a sign way above their heads that said (in both Chinese and English): "No photos." That experience dampened my enthusiasm for the remainder of my trip.

In Mexico, I used both a point and shoot (an automatic camera) and a 35mm camera. No one ever shied away from having their photo taken. Once, when I was in the main square, several street kids came over and wanted their picture taken. I let them look through the viewfinder and showed them how to focus on an image. I also did that with my point and shoot when I visited a beach and the countryside. Some of the people wanted their pictures taken because it was very rare that someone with a camera would come by. With the people in the countryside, I gave them copies of the photos.

AM Your photographs show some wonderful expressions and rich contrasts. Black and white photography seems to emphasize the texture of things so much more. How did you come to use black and white, as opposed to color film? Do you do your own developing?

VL As I stated earlier, my original impetus to learn photography was to be able to capture police brutality. I took a beginners' photography course and discovered that the camera can be used not only to capture injustice, but the beautiful little things in the world that one might not notice or remember otherwise. I do my own developing and printing when working with black and white. I've never learned much about using color film--I keep meaning to take a class, but, with motherhood, there never seems to be enough time.

AM Did you or do you have a mentor who has encouraged you in your artistic pursuits?

VL When I was in high school, I started writing with a woman who ran writing workshops for adult women. She had a private session for me and another high school girl even though we couldn't afford to pay her for her time. She was very supportive and encouraging of my writing. I'll still send her pieces that I'm working on and give her copies of my zines. She continues to be encouraging and supportive of my writing and my life. I've also had other zinesters praise my writing, which is always encouraging. Unfortunately, I haven't found much support for my photography.

AM You also write, including writing for zines. Do you have your own zine?

VL Before becoming a mother, I did one-off travel zines. One day, I sat down and made a zine about my 1997 trip to Hong Kong, months before the handover to China. I made less than 10 copies of it and gave it to a couple of friends.

I've also made travel zines about my stay in Mexico and another one about my trip to Hong Kong and China in 2000. When I travel, I send postcards to my cat. In Mexico, I only sent her a few. In Hong Kong and China, I sent her one every day. I sat down and made a zine using the postcards and snippets from my travel journals to help me remember what I saw and what I felt at the time.

I've been working on a more detailed zine about Mexico since my daughter was born, but have lost the inspiration several times. The pieces are sitting in an envelope at home marked "Mexico: Words." This past summer, I started a zine about my visit to South Africa, but also lost interest in it. I suppose eventually I'll finish it. The same thing happened with my zine about Hong Kong and China--it sat for a few months and then, one wintry day, I stayed at work late and finished it.

AM What types of writing do you enjoy the most?

VL It depends on how I'm feeling and what I'm trying to do. Most of the time I write without an audience in mind. Recently, I've written a few pieces for specific zines--all non-fiction narratives and essays. Six months after my daughter was born, I started and finished the first draft of a novella about a mother in the South Bronx trying to raise a houseful of children and grandchildren. Once I finished that first draft, I let it sit for a year before even typing it into the computer. I'm revising it little by little, but there's no intended market or reader(s) in mind. The first part of it was posted as a Fiction feature on the website Mamaphonic a few months ago.

AM Do you feel like having your daughter has changed your art in any way?

VL It's changed my writing. I look at the story I wrote after she was born and see that there are touches of motherhood everywhere. Little memories of her appear in all of the woman's children. I'm starting to write from a female perspective. Before she was born, a lot of my fiction was written with a male voice--partially as a way to figure out what the other person was thinking or feeling. Now, while I wouldn't say it's always from the female point-of-view, I'm exploring that angle a lot more.

It's slowed down my photography a lot. It's harder to pull the camera out, point, focus and click at just the right moment when a 2-year-old is demanding your attention. It's also harder to manuever into the small spaces of hidden life with a stroller. I also haven't been in the darkroom as much since she was born. Sometimes it makes me sad. Sometimes I'm okay with it and feel that one day, I can go back to it.

AM Do you do the majority of your photography and writing while you are with your daughter?

VL Unfortunately, no. I've found that I can get a lot of writing done while she's napping, but, as she grows older, she naps less. She used to sleep late so I would get up early (by early, I mean 8 am), drink my coffee and write. Now she wakes me up in the morning a lot of times, so I don't get that me-time in. I've been lucky in that I have a supportive group of friends who will occupy her if I'm trying to work on something and am under a deadline.

AM You have recently applied for a Fulbright Scholarship to do some photography in Asia. Can you describe the Fullbright process a bit? How can someone find this information? What expenses does it cover? How difficult is it to obtain?

VL The summer after I graduated from college, I received a letter from the school's scholarship office inviting me to apply for a Fulbright. I called the office and was told that there was no interview process, to just pick up the application. The application was also available on-line so I used that instead. I had to write a project proposal and a narrative describing myself and my experiences. Since I was applying to photograph the fishing villages in Hong Kong, I also needed to send them a portfolio of my work. I like working large--11*14 prints at least. I also like to mount my photographs on matte board, partially because I have problems getting borders even. I made 10-12 of them and then went to their information session and found out that the judges actually prefer smaller pieces so that they don't break their backs carrying them! With less than 2 months left, I was in the darkroom almost every night printing 8*10 photographs and trying to get the borders right. The photographs above are from that body of work.

I applied for the Fulbright Student grant for recent college graduates. In many countries, the Fulbright grant also has a stipend for dependents, which made it more attractive to me. There are other Fulbright grants available for teachers and non-students too: http://www.iie.org/Template.cfm?&Template=/programs/fulbright/us/default.htm

It's a very prestigious grant to receive, so I'm sure the competition is high. I've been told that most students apply to go to Europe, so that's where there's the most competition. I think only 21 students applied to go to Hong Kong last year. But all of the awardees had academic topics, not one of them had a visual arts project. So that makes me a bit nervous about my chances.

AM If you could give one piece of advice to other moms trying to do their art, what would it be?

VL Only one piece of advice? To hell with housework. Pursue your art! But seriously, I think that most moms are discouraged from pursuing their art. I was reading Joanna Russ's How to Suppress Women's Writing while preparing my Fulbright application. I don't remember the exact wording, but she said something to the effect that women are conditioned to put everyone else's needs before their own. Women need to learn to make time for their own needs and dreams.