Joe Manzanov (Don Benito, 1980) is a freelance photographer and journalist who has an extensive experience in photojournalism, travel photography, portraiture and reporting, specializing in social issues (human rights, migration and childhood). He has lived and worked in Spain, Portugal, Brazil, Italy, Bulgaria and The Netherlands. 

In 2009 he was awarded a grant that allowed him to study the last year of his degree in Journalism in Rio de Janeiro, where he specialized in written and graphic reporting. Once back in Madrid, he attended a literary journalism workshop taught by Doménico Chiappe at the Escuela Fuentetaja (Fuentetaja School). From there on, he moved to Bulgaria and, since then, his work as a journalist has been mainly focused on chronicles, non-fiction narrative, photo reporting and research through personal stories. 

In the period between late 2013 and mid 2016, he focused exclusively on documenting the migration flux that went into Western Europe through Bulgaria and the Balkans. During that time, his work was published in Germany (Stuttgarter-Nachrichten), Switzerland (20minutos), Italy (Shoot4change) and, mainly, Bulgaria, (TEMA, Dnevnik) and Spain (La Vanguardia, FronteraD, Zazpika, etc). He has also taken part in several photography exhibitions and collaborated with NGOs on different social and investigative projects relating the migration issue.

Resulting from all of that experience, his book Hostal Europa, was published in October 2018 by Libros.com editorial.

It is a literary chronic, backed by a detailed photo report, that tells the story of four asylum seekers in Bulgaria. The book shows the inefficient asylum-seeking system in Bulgaria and Europe and puts it on the spotlight, as well as exposing the grim reality of the marginalized Arab neighborhood in Sofia. 

For the last decade, he has taken part in several medium and long term projects, that have help him achieve an in-depth approach to people, places and stories, that are either ignored or not well known, but deserve to be told. He has a strong commitment with the rigor, passion and empathy needed to tell real stories and capture intimate moments with humanity.

He has ongoing projects in Spain, Italy and the Balkans at the present moment. He is a co-founder and editor of the blog Un diván en la luna, luná, an online platform that serves as a space for publishing the various shades that shape Bulgaria’s convoluted reality through different disciplines – journalism, photography, theatre and poetry- with a polyphonic use of language. 

He is a contributor in the photojournalism agency NurPhoto as well as a member of the Investigative Journalists Association in Spain (API) and of the Association of Spanish-speaking Journalists in Bulgaria.

He is available for worldwide assignments and collaborations. He speaks Spanish, Portuguese, English and Italian and can communicate in Bulgarian. 

2022

– Artist in Residence. Selected by OT301, an international artist organization/collective located in the former Amsterdam Film Academy building, to participate in their 3-month artist-in-residence program.

2021

– “Worlds and colors”. First prize in the annual contest of the Association of Spanish-Speaking Journalists in Bulgaria for Un diván en la luna, luná, an editorial project that has been published as a blog in the digital journalism and culture magazine FronteraD.

2019

– “Worlds and colors”. First prize in the annual contest of the Association of Spanish-Speaking Journalists in Bulgaria for his book Hostal Europa (Hostel Europe).

– “Scorci d’Abruzzo”. Collective exhibition organized by the Abrussels Association of Brussels (Belgium).

2016

– “Borders of compassion”. Photo exhibition in Sofia’s Lover’s Bridge (Bulgaria).

2015

–  ” Welcome to the West”. Childhood and vulnerable communities exhibition in “Roca” Lounge in Sofia.

– “Worlds and colors”. Honorary mention in the annual contest of the Association of Spanish-Speaking Journalists in Bulgaria for the report “Bulgaria, the European dream and nightmare of the Syrian refugees”, published by FronteraD.

2014

 “Children Photo Workshop”, Coordinator and educator at the photography workshop for Syrian refugee kids held in the Voenna Rampa Refugee Camp. It offered the kids a chance to try out new experiences, express themselves, get over past trauma, and, most importantly, have fun during uncertain times lots of families were experimenting in Bulgaria. 

2008

– “Re-discovering Brazil, a country beyond clichés”. Presentation and exhibition in a congress organized by the Brazilian Studies Centre in the Salamanca University.