Aya Brackett is a San Francisco-based photographer who was born and raised in a traditional Japanese house in the mountains of Northern California. She grew up with two wood stoves, a generator for electricity and a long dirt road. Brackett left California to study at Brown University where she received a dual B.A. in Visual Arts and East Asian Studies, and also studied photography at Rhode Island School of Design and the California College of the Arts. For four years she worked as one of the photo editors at Dwell Magazine and then left to pursue her own travels and work. She shoots for a variety of advertising and editorial clients and also does personal ongoing projects. Her work has been shown in numerous galleries, is in private collections and in the permanent collection of the Crocker Art Museum.