Why Print Still Matters in 2025
Every year, someone announces the “death of print.” They point to the dominance of digital platforms, the speed of social media, and the infinite scroll of images. But let me be very clear: for a true photographer, print is not dead—it is eternal.
Photography was never meant to live its whole life on a glowing screen, compressed into pixels and cropped for an algorithm’s square. We are not digital artists. Our work was not birthed to be thumbed through at 0.3 seconds a glance between a meme and a dance clip. A photograph is a composition of light and shadow, intention and frequency—and it deserves to be seen in the scale and form it was created for.
When I hold a print of my work, there is weight to it. Texture. Presence. A print transforms a fleeting image into an artifact. It shifts from “content” into “culture.” You cannot swipe past it. You must confront it, engage with it, allow it to breathe in your space.
The scale of print matters. A body at life-size, a portrait larger than you, a detail sharp enough that you feel you can step into it—these are things a phone screen cannot replicate. When an image is printed, it restores photography to what it was always meant to be: an immersive experience that commands your attention.
Digital is disposable. Print is archival. In fifty years, when someone wants to understand who we were, they won’t be scrolling an old Instagram feed. They’ll be holding a book, flipping through pages, standing in a gallery before a print. Print carries permanence. It becomes history.
In 2025, this permanence is even more radical because the mainstream has forgotten it. Everyone is chasing immediacy. Few are building legacy. If you are a photographer who only posts and never prints, you’re feeding the machine but starving your own immortality.
So yes—print is alive, more alive than ever. Not because it trends, but because it transcends.
And as long as I create, my work will live in print. Because photography was never meant to be disposable. It was meant to be legendary.
