About Gracie
Grace Kessels is a Dutch-Australian artist with over seven years of professional experience in the creative industry. After picking up a camera at 10 and starting working as a photographer at the tender age of 14, she began refining her craft to bring you artworks that are powerful and vibrant. She has worked in New Zealand, shot for NGOs in Nepal, and worked across Australia from Melbourne to Sydney to Townsville, Birdsville and many places in between.
She has photographed for a wide range of international accounting organisations, national banks, news organisations, universities, medical professionals, festivals, nightclubs and brands such as Dilmah and NewsCorp.
She photographed the Adani protests from Brisbane to the Whitsundays in 2019 and filmed the effect of the Black Summer fires in Australia from Melbourne to Brisbane in January 2020. She has worked for NGOs in Nepal and Australia that are working against human trafficking, muscular dystrophy and domestic violence.
In 2021, she expanded and set up Cloud X Media, a Brisbane-based corporate photography company that shatters the bland flour that is corporate photography to show people in their most empowered light with her team’s lenses.
Prior to leaving for Europe (July of 2022 - end of July 2023), she and her team at Cloud X Media had done over 160 shoots with over 80 of them between February and July of 2023.
Small Beginnings
The little slideshow below is my journey as a photographer in photos…
When I was 10 years old, I used to get in trouble for taking my mother's phone and putting it on silent so no one would know how many photos I was taking! This is the youngest photo of myself I've found with a camera - I must have been between 6 and 8 years old.
I started learning how to take photos at a school course when I was 10 years. You would often find me with a camera attached to my hip after I was 11/12 years old.
When I was 16, I got my first job working professionally as a photographer. Although I had done paid photoshoots from when I was 14, this was my first time working for a company. I really enjoyed going to parties and helping people feel confident, beautiful and included.
I started working for UQ Union when I was 17 years old and still in high school. It was strange and exciting to be in this limbo between high school world and university world. This is me at my formal showing a friend how I wanted them to take my photo. I can recall my mum saying to me, "This will be you at your wedding someday!".
When I was 18, I started working at the university balls and then going to work as a photographer in the clubs after. I couldn't drive yet so I would often sleep on friends couches after work if I finished too late to get a train home (because they stopped too early sometimes). We had quick deadlines so I would sometimes fall asleep next to my laptop open after a late shoot.
In 2018, I went to Nepal for 8 and a half weeks and did some fun photoshoots with different people over there. On this particular day, I got together with some girls, and we got all dressed up together and had a photoshoot. It was so fun! I also did work with different NGOs as a photographer while I was over there.
2018 was my first time working full-time as a photographer. I photographed for the World Health Organisation while in Kathmandu, Dilmah for an event at the Sofitel Hotel and photographed events in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne. I also photographed weddings, engagement parties, baby showers, lots of different society events at UQ and clubs in the city. It was a wild time!
My first full-frame DSLR Frankie and I taking a food break.
I am not sure when this was taken. In 2019 I did my first overseas photoshoot with CAANZ in Auckland, New Zealand and photographed the Adani Protest from Brisbane to Claremont and got to meet Bob Brown in the process and watch John Williams play live. That was really cool.
In 2019 I moved to Melbourne but would fly back to photograph with my favourite clients.
After 5 years of dreaming up establishing my own photography business, I started Cloud X Media in 2021. I wanted to create a different kind of event photography business that specialised in low light candid photography. I had some less-than-ideal experiences working for other people and wanted to create a safe place for photographers to work.
In the 12 months before I left on exchange in August of 2023, Cloud X Media did over 150+ shoots (80 of those were between February and August of that year). On top of quoting, invoicing, photographing, editing, managing internal administrative members and sales AND different marketing initiatives with a marketer - this was huge.
In 2023, I got to meet Australian rugby icon Jonathan Thurston while working at a shoot. He was absolutely lovely!
In 2023, I photographed Splendour in the Grass for the first time with the Courier Mail. This was my first time photographing American celebrity artists (I had photographed Guy Sebastian once). I was freaking out watching Ruel, J Balvin, Ocean Alley and Lizzo - all artists I'd listened to before but never thought I'd be able to photograph perform!
In June of 2023, the Courier Mail asked if I wanted to go out and photograph the Big Red Bash in Birdsville. There was only one answer: YES!!! It was incredible. I loved working alongside amazing photographers, journalists and PR people.
In 2023, I took 6 months off to go to Europe to go on exchange at Erasmus University. I had been slowly pecking away at my business degree while focussing on building Cloud X Media. It gave me the opportunity to indulge in different art works from galleries around Europe and have the space to work out my next steps!
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