Jeanny Tsai Bio

Jeanny Tsai is a photographer, storyteller, and lover of life who specializes in documentary, ethnographic, and portrait photography. Jeanny keeps one foot in the East Coast of the US and the rest of her belongs to the World. She has a passion for photographing people and cultures worldwide that express their devotion to the divine through rituals and celebrations. She also seeks to photograph people and places that are facing environmental or social challenges that threaten established culturally rich ways of life. Some of the countries where she has photographed projects of this nature include Brazil, India, Indonesia, Nepal, and the US. She desires that her photos inspire others through beauty and convey a positive, uplifting testimony of people and places despite the existing external circumstances. She is constantly inspired by all the people she meets who greet her with openness and a desire to share their stories and lives.

Jeanny is also a documentary film and television director/producer with over 20 years experience. She has directed and produced documentary programs for major cable television networks including National Geographic Wild, Nat Geo, A & E, Discovery Channel, Discovery+, TLC, MTV, VH1, and WETv, and on documentary films for theatrical and streaming release. As a director of photography, she has shot on award winning documentary films that were theatrically released including the acclaimed, ground-breaking film, The Aggressives, directed by Daniel Peddle, which she also co-produced. She was also a cinematographer on the highly acclaimed follow up film, Beyond The Aggressives which premiered in theaters at the end of 2023. Beyond the Aggressives is nominated for outstanding best documentary film for the GLAAD awards.

She aims for her stories to create greater awareness of the social and cultural issues in diverse communities and create social change out in the world.

Jeanny’s photos have been exhibited in group and solo shows in galleries, published in magazines, and published in collaboration with NGOs including Amazon Watch. Jeanny teaches documentary filmmaking for the purpose of empowering storytellers to create social change and has taught a module on ethical storytelling in indigenous communities for the Young Environmental Journalists program at the United Nations. She had a solo show of her photo series First Nations: Dancers and Wisdom Keepers in 2019 at the Six Depot Gallery in Massachusetts. Her photo book Retratos do Recôncavo was awarded one of best in show for the annual photo book competition at the David Orton Gallery in Hudson, NY and at The Griffin Museum of Photography in Massachusetts in 2016. In 2021, she was a featured artist at Rites of Passage 20/20 Vision, an art and performance living museum co-created by a collective of women of color artists and performers. Her photographs of women of the Asian Diaspora and their ancestors were shown on a wall in the “Grief Room” alongside walls of photos of women from the African, Americas, and Middle Eastern Diasporas. She also documented each room for the entire run of the show for an upcoming book for Rites of Passage 20/20 vision.

Jeanny is a member of Authority Collective, Diversify Photo, and Women Photograph.