Matilde Simas is a freelance documentary photographer from Boston, MA.  She considers photography to be a tool to drive social change and empower storytelling.  Her work focuses on issues of dignity and human rights around the world, illuminating the enduring strength of victims, survivors, and people affected by trauma. In her work, she actively seeks to allow her subjects’ agency — a way to impact the story and reclaim truth.

Matilde uses the capacity of photography to inform, provoke discussion, and inspire action by public speaking and exhibiting her work in museums, galleries, and public spaces. Working internationally for humanitarian organizations, her storytelling has helped vulnerable children in Namibia attend school, amplified Maasai female voices, and supported human trafficking victims/survivors to name just a few ways she has created tangible change.  

Her work on human trafficking has been widely exhibited by various UN agencies.  She has recently been awarded a UNICEF Photo of the Year award and she also emerged the winner of the 2017, 2018 and 2019 Social Cause International Photography Award from the Lucie Foundation. In 2017, she founded Capture Humanity, an organization focused on brining awareness to and preventing human trafficking.