Suna Lee: Won state, regional photography awards

Image Caption: Award-winning photographer Suna Lee is shown in her McLean studio with some of her work. "My heart was always burning for photography, not the corporate type of work," she says.

Suna Lee's first camera was a Nikon.. "I still have it. It's antique like," she said, laughing. "It is my favorite camera still." A lot has happened since that first Nikon-- almost three decades' worth, and the McLean photographer still loves her work as much as that dusty camera. Recently, the 17-state South East Professional Photographers Association awarded Lee a first prize for her tender portrait of a mother and baby, and the Virginia Professional Photographers Association awarded her a first prize for her portrait of a woman, titled "Sumatra." Her path toward portrait photography began after Lee came to the United States from Korea when she was 17. She spent time in Iowa before heading to Indiana University to study art. "That's where my heart was," said Lee, 47. After a year and a half of studying art, Lee started attending photography classes, and everything just sort of, well, clicked. She traveled and worked after college, but "my heart was always burning for photography , not the corporate type of work, " she said. So, she started taking photos of her son and neighborhood kids. "I was always into people, always modeling people instead of landscapes," she said. "I loved people." And soon a career was formed.

For two years, her home was her studio. In 1981, she and a partner opened a studio in a storefront on Columbia Pike in Annandale. The studio was known as L&S Photography until Lee bought out the partner and changed the name to Lee's Photography. In 1987, she moved the business to Arlington Boulevard in Falls Church. After 10 years in Falls Church, she moved to McLean. "The exciting part of my work is that there is no certain category of people," Lee said. She said she takes pictures of "newborn babies all the way to age 80. All different classes of people: clients who make $20,000 a year to clients who make millions a year." Lee has taught other professional photographers at the Winona International School of Professional Photography and she is a frequent lecturer at professional photography seminars throughout the United States. But in the end, it all comes back to her photography subjects. "I look at the face first . . . It's the first impression, but it goes a lot deeper then that. I get to know them better and bring their spirit out. That is what makes my job worthwhile."