5 Top Instagram Photographers Select the Best Accounts to Follow

5 minute read

As Instagram celebrates its fifth anniversary, five top Instagram photographers – Malin Fezehai, Ruddy Roye, David Guttenfelder, Alec Soth and Sacha Lecca – share with TIME the five accounts they can’t live without.

Malin Fezehai’s (@malinfezehai) selection

I enjoy Joe Penney’s (@joepenney) feed because of his daily life images across West Africa, and I also love his portraits that have a very distinct sensibility.

Matilde Gattoni (@matildegattoni) captures the beauty of the places and people she encounters, and makes you want to be right there with her. She works on interesting projects and her images are stunning.

Nayyirah Waheed (@nayyirah.waheed) is my favorite poet at the moment, and the poems that she posts say a lot with very few words.

Marawa Wamp (@marawa) is a professional hula hooper and I am fascinated by all of the creative ways she uses hoops, and it’s a fun feed to follow.

Asa Sjostrom (@asasjostromphotography) is a photographer that is fairly new to Instagram but is off to a great start. I loved her posts from her project in Moldova and the way she photographed her family in Sweden this summer.

Ruddy Roye’s (@ruddyroye) selection

Visubal (@visubal) is a source of inspiration and a teaching tool for me and my sons to develop our football skills.

Eugene Richards (@eugenerichardsphotography) because there’s no other photographer that has the amount of care for humanity and shoots as he does.

I like being inspired by difference. While I am loud and more of a hit-you-over-the-head, all in-your-face type of a photographer, Dan Winters (@danwintersphoto) is quiet and subdued.

Benjamin Lowy (@benlowy) is a friend whose wit and style continues to inspire me.

1 in 20 (@1in20) because the memory of my father is there. Because I find sanity there. And because knowing that I am not alone keeps me whole.

David Guttenfelder’s (@dguttenfelder) selection

I’m a longtime fan of all of Gueorgui Pinkhassov’s photography (@pinkhassov). He is the most visually sophisticated and has a surprising, personal way of seeing the world. This is especially wonderful because he finds it all in the otherwise mundane parts of life around us.

Mmuseumm (@mmuseumm) somehow finds and photographs the most curious, hilarious, smartest little contemporary artifacts, hidden in plain sight, on the streets.

There’s dark and haunting beauty in every single picture Victor Cobo (@victor_cobo) shows us on Instagram.

Stacy Kranitz (@stacykranitz) travels alone and bravely immerses herself fully into people’s lives. She isn’t a photographer getting “access” and passing judgment. She seems to live her life very open-hearted. We are lucky we get to share in some of it though her photography on Instagram.

It’s Matt Slaby’s (@mattslaby) combination of photography and thoughtful, funny prose that attracts me. I rush to look and read every post.

Alec Soth’s (@littlebrownmushroom) selection

Relatively new to Instagram, Chien-Chi Chang (@Chien_Chi_Chang) is quickly become a master of the form.

I’m always delighted to see Vrnda Vahey’s (@vrnda_vahey) little jewels in my feed.

Katrin Koenning (@k_koenning) for her consistent aesthetic bliss.

Hans Seeger (@hansseeger) is my go-to guy for refined eyes.

Elizabeth Huey (@elizabeth_huey) because it’s not fair that such a good painter can be such a good photographer.

Sacha Lecca’s (@sacha_lecca) selection

Boogie (@boogiephotographer) is a street photographer and through his Instagram feed you’re taken along to the streets of New York, Moscow, Rio, Kingston, and more.

Baron Wolman (@baronwolman) was the very first photographer for Rolling Stone magazine. His posts are an incredible look at his amazing career and rock ’n’ roll history.

Stacy Kranitz (@stacykranitz) is a badass. I’m always drawn to her work, and love how personal it is. It’s always fascinating to see where she’s working and what she’s seeing.

I love how effortless Thomas Prior’s (@thomas_prior) photography appears, he makes beautiful images often from the ordinary.

I was aware of Arto Saari’s (@artofoto) career as a pro skater, but not as a photographer until some photo research for a story in 2011 and I’ve been enjoying his work ever since. In particular the more reportage/lifestyle images of a skaters life, rather than photographs of tricks.

Olivier Laurent is the editor of TIME LightBox. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram @olivierclaurent

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