Today we’d like to introduce you to Arturo Bullard.
Hi Arturo, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
Since I was a child, I always dreamed of knowing the world, of going beyond the borders of Lima, my city and Peru, my country.
I became a traveler rather than a photographer. Thanks to my brother, when I was around 18 years old, I started backpacking through Peru. When I finished school, I was not sure what to study, I was never a good student at school.
In the end, I opted to study communications. It was there that I took a basic photography course and I fell in love with this art; but I had my doubts, it was the beginning of the 90s and in my country photography was a hobby, not a profession.
At the end of my technical career, I received an invitation to be one of the field assistants from Frans Lanting, a prominent NATGEO photographer. He would go 45 days to Tambopata, in the Peruvian Amazon, to write an article on macaws.
That is how I met this icon of global nature photography; It was the first time that I met a person who traveled the world doing photography; It was the first time I heard about places like Borneo, Okavango, Madagascar and other fascinating places that years later I was able to discover with my camera.
Upon returning from that trip, I arrived in Lima determined that I wanted to be like Frans Lanting and travel photographing the world; But I found another reality, I had neither the experience nor the equipment and above all, I lived in a country where it was almost a utopia to dedicate yourself to being a travel and nature photographer.
The following years I did all kinds of photography: Events, weddings, sports, advertising, etc.; The money I earned, which was not much, I spent traveling with my backpack and camera through Peru.
After ten years, doing photographic work that I did not like and was passionate about, I founded a publishing company (2004) together with a partner, where we launched a mining magazine called Rumbo Minero.
After a year, the magazine became a success, then other magazines came and we began to organize events in the areas of Mining, Fishing and Construction. By that time, I had already stopped photography, my camera lived inside a drawer.
By then, my company had around 80 employees and financially, I was doing very well. In 2009, I go on vacation to Costa Rica, a country that I always wanted to know.
For that trip, I renewed my photographic equipment; Those ten days in Costa Rica changed my life, I met again that passionate and traveling Arturo who had been consumed by the corporate world.
From that trip, I founded my first travel blog and began to travel to different parts of the world whenever the opportunity arose. They were my first trips to Africa and the Middle East; I also traveled a lot in Central America, a place in the world that I loved. In those years, I wrote the following sentence: “I do not live from photography, but photography makes me live”.
My life had become a roller coaster, I only felt alive when I was traveling; I really hated my job, but I was there because I was making good money.
In 2013, thanks to the great support of Michelle, my girlfriend, today my wife, I decided to sell the shares of my company and go to my dreams and passions. I did not have a clear path, I did not know how I was going to make money traveling the world, but what if I was determined was to change that corporate life that was not working for me.
One day Michelle told me: “What weighs more than a kilo of 100 dollar bills or a kilo of happiness”, that phrase was made me “take the leap”.
He wanted to live the life I wanted, not the one I had.
The following years were of construction, I focused on growing my social networks, I knew that they would be an important window to position myself as a travel photographer and traveler.
Today at 51 years old and eight years after I left my company, I live from travel photography, my social networks and group trips that I organize to different destinations on the planet (India, Botswana, Costa Rica, Bolivia, Peru, etc.).
Thanks to my work, I have had the opportunity to travel to more than 50 countries in the world and have traveled a large part of Peru, my country.
Four months I moved to Costa Rica with my wife and my two children, four and seven years old. I made a new radical change in my life, always seeking well-being and quality of life for them and for me.
I end with a phrase that my father instilled in my brothers and me:
“Never leave your passions that are the engine of the soul, the day you do not live your passions, even if your heart beats, you will be dead”.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It has certainly not been an easy road. The life of an entrepreneur goes up and down; In my case, when I sold my company, I knew what I wanted to do but did not know how to achieve it.
At the beginning, there was a lot of trial and error, the errors being more frequent than the successes. The first four years were difficult, but little by little things happened.
I had to create my new way of earning a living, laying stone upon stone on a path that was not very clear and in which there were not many references to whom to follow; In those years, not many people wanted to make a living from a travel blog and social networks.
Without a doubt, the biggest complication I have had was the COVID pandemic, my travel company was doing very well until the borders closed, which coincidentally caught me in India with 13 travelers.
With the COVID, I had to cancel and postpone many trips with groups that I had that year, an issue that affected me a lot emotionally. After three months, I “woke up” and started looking for other alternatives to earn money, among other things I started giving OnLine photography workshops and working with brands on my social networks; I also started selling photographs from my archive for decoration.
I believe that adversity forces us to make changes in our lives, if things are not working for us, it is our responsibility to “turn the wheel” so that they work for us.
In my case, due to the COVID crisis in Peru, added to the complicated political situation we were experiencing, we decided to move to Costa Rica. It is not easy to leave your country, but together with my wife, we saw that we had to do it if we wanted to continue growing as people, as a family and at work.
Without a doubt, it was the best decision we could make.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
My work is a table with three legs.
The first one is photography, since I sold my company eight years ago, I decided that I would only do travel and nature photography; And that’s what I do.
As a travel photographer, I do work for hotels, airlines, tourist destinations, etc. Photography has been the key that has led me to know the world. I also teach different workshops, publish my work in books and magazines and sell my photographs for decoration of houses and businesses.
The second leg of the table are social networks, thanks to them, hand in hand with photography, I do specific campaigns for different brands; I have also been an ambassador in Peru for recognized brands such as Canon, Apple, Nissan, Appleton, etc.
And last but not least, this is my travel company with which I organize group trips, with unique experiences, to different destinations around the world.
The three legs of the table feed back each other, I think that one would not work without the other.
I am proud to be able to live off my passion, although the path is not always easy, but following that route and navigating the waters I am in was my choice.
In my social networks, I show how important it is to live for you and not for others, I show, together with my wife, the importance of educating and sowing values to our children by traveling.
Through photography, I show the wonders that exist in the world; always giving a consistent and positive message; and encouraging people to break the traditional social mold so that they are encouraged to live their passions and go after their dreams.
Who else deserves credit in your story?
The first ones are my parents, they supported me from the beginning when I decided to be a photographer at a time when photography was a “profession” of hippies and lazy people.
I remember in 1993 when I sat in front of my father to tell him that I wanted to be a photographer. He looked at me as if saying: “How are you going to make a living from that?” but he didn’t tell me. He touched my shoulder and he said: I don’t really understand how you’re going to live as a photographer, but if you want to do it, do it, but, do it well”.
Then there is Frans Lanting, thanks to that work I did as his field assistant, I discovered, first-hand, that there are people who live traveling and photographing the world. He does not know, I did not see him again, but thanks to him I am a photographer.
And the third person is my wife Michelle, I met her when I was a businessman and I was doing very well financially. Six months after we met, she was the one who encouraged me and convinced me that I was not on the right path; that I was dying in life.
It was thanks to their advice and great support that I took the courage to leave a financially comfortable life, but it was consuming me physically and emotionally and go after my dreams and passions.
To this day, Michelle is my great support.
Contact Info:
- Email: [email protected]
- Website: https://arturobullard.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/arturobullard
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/arturobullardfotografia
Image Credits
Principal Photo: Yasmine Kahatt
