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@malakhaipearson
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XYZ is a collection of photographs made between 2024 and 2026 while traveling across the country on assignment and in the in-between moments of everyday life. The zine brings together personal photographs with images from commercial projects, outtakes, quiet observations, and frames that fell outside a client's final deliverables. Included are photographs made while working with USAL Project and Public Records in Brooklyn, as well as a single 8 mm frame captured by Darwin Pemberthy on the set of a commercial production in Boston in 2024.
Across 50 + pages, XYZ explores the relationship between my personal practice and my work as a commercial photographer. Rather than treating those worlds as separate, the zine reflects how each continually shapes the other.
The title comes from my everyday speak. "XYZ" has always been shorthand for this, that, whatever comes next a phrase that speaks to movement, possibility, and the spaces in between. To me, it embodies the way I move through the world and make images. The moments in this book are small and subtle, but still beautiful to me.
This zine is a curated selection from my digital archive. These photographs are not leftovers or afterthoughts; they are the connective tissue between assignments, travels, and daily observations. XYZ is a record of the images that continue to resonate long after they were made, revealing how my work and my life are ultimately inseparable.
The Zine comes with three collectible stickers. It’s a perfect-bound A5 photo book printed and assembled here in NYC, USA.
Purchase online here.
Promotional short directed, filmed, and edited by the great and powerful Neil Shukla.
Announcement for Malakhai’s forthcoming photo zine XYZ. This is a special NYC release in partnership with Grand Street Pizza and Converse.
Photos below captured by Omna Alemayehu on 35mm during the event.
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Take..a..breath...
A look at some recent photo work. Commercial, personal, and everything in between.
1.“Open Mat @ Renzo’s” cc: @Shoyoroll
2. A cleanse: Digital image of pre-shift rituals cc: @publicrecords
3. Joel Popoteur: for @Arcteryx community climb bight in Boston
4.“Blue” from a late night for @publicrecordsnyc
5. Work for Textures cc: @vibramfivefingers s/o Christian and Emilio
6. Excerpt from “Blue,” an ongoing project looking at grappling in NYC, 2026, Malakhai Pearson cc: @thedojonyc
7. Curry Hackett 2026, cc: @acehotelbrooklyn
8. TOUCHING BASS, Joseph Zeal-Henry in 2025, captured during my documentation of the SUPA SYSTEM in collaboration with Harvard GSD + the Harvard Art Lab (All rights reserved)
9. Work for Textures cc: @vibramfivefingers s/o Christian and Emilio
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