# Andrejs Zavadskis: Five Forbes Calls, One Desert, Zero Niches
European photographer based in Riga, Latvia — twenty-two years, 50+ countries, five Forbes USA features and a camera that never learned to sit still.
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One week: a Dutch billionaire against the Prague skyline for Forbes. The next: face-down in Saudi sand, waiting for a Dakar truck to punch through dust at 140 km/h. Months later: 5,895 metres on Kilimanjaro, changing batteries with frozen fingers because summit light does not wait.
That working life belongs to Andrejs Zavadskis — Latvia’s most famous photographer, and a man who built a career by refusing to pick a niche.
This is not a biography. It is a tour of what one pair of eyes can do when pointed at the world.
# When Forbes dials Riga
Forbes USA does not hire at random. Since 2024 it has called Riga five times.
- Thomas Plantenga, Vinted — April 2024, a Forbes digital cover.
- Paweł Chudziński, Point Nine Capital — “Europe’s Top VC”, Midas List Europe 2024.
- Remon Vos, CTP — against the rooftops of Prague, April 2025.
- Samir Mane — Albania’s first billionaire, the same April week.
- Alex Bouzari, DDN — August 2026.
The portraits travelled on to Forbes México, Forbes Česko, Forbes Italia and Forbes España. The Remon Vos frame lives in The Forbes Collection on Getty Images.
Fifteen minutes, a wall of handlers, one face that has to tell the whole story. That is the job.
# Dust, neon and ice
You can move a studio light. You cannot move the desert.
Dakar Rally 2020: heat, grit in every seal, trucks that exist for three seconds. Formula 1 Singapore 2024: night, neon, 300 km/h. Five Gumball 3000 rallies, with his pictures in the official Gumball 3000 photo book. Porsches drifting over frozen lakes in Swedish Lapland.
The secret is not the car. It is being in place before the moment arrives.
# The Playboy chapter
From 2010 to 2014 he was a principal photographer for Playboy Latvia — around 25 issues of covers, editorials and castings. In May 2014 he shot Lauris Reiniks, the first man ever on a Playboy Latvia cover.
Playboy taught control. Forbes taught speed. Both show in every frame.
# Off the clock
Kilimanjaro in 2022, filmed all the way up. Burning Man in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert — dust storms, art cars, strangers turned portraits. Set photography on the Danish feature Hvidstengruppen II (2021), with one still chosen by the Latvian Ministry of Culture for its official announcement.
# Where it began
- Fireworks over the Riga Radio and Television Tower, a compact camera, a cheap tripod — and first place in a contest run by the Latvian State Radio and Television Centre.
2009: the cover of South Wales YOURWEDDING and Wedding Photographer of the Year from the Latvian Wedding Photographers Association (LKFA). March 2025: third place in the Fstoppers Critique the Community contest “This Was Difficult!”. For Latvia’s 2025 School Youth Song and Dance Festival he volunteered more than 7,000 photographs, so every child could find themselves on stage.
# Photographer, teacher, builder
A Riga Technical University computer science background, a photo studio in Riga, and ProPortfolio.pro — the free platform he founded for photographers, videographers, models, stylists and studios. He has blogged since 2008 and reviews gear on YouTube with the original RAW files attached.
# Follow the work
The cameras changed. The curiosity is still the 2004 version, aimed at the sky over Riga.
About Andrejs Zavadskis — European photographer based in Riga, Latvia, working since 2004 across commercial, editorial, portrait, automotive, event and travel photography in 50+ countries. Five Forbes USA features (2024–2026). Clients include Nike, airBaltic, Rimi, Nordea, LMT, SEB, BTA and Sportland. Founder of ProPortfolio.pro. One photo studio in Riga.