Kayla Isomura is a photojournalist based in Vancouver, B.C. As a multigenerational settler of Chinese and Japanese descent, Kayla’s interest in storytelling has been largely influenced by their family’s story of displacement. Through this lens, Kayla is often drawn to stories that focus on the intersections of identity, memory and place.

Most notably, Kayla produced The Suitcase Project, which made its debut at the Nikkei National Museum in 2018 and is currently touring. Their work has been published in the Globe and Mail, The Tyee and Megaphone, among others. Kayla is a graduate of the journalism program at Langara College and most recently completed a diploma in photojournalism from Loyalist College.

Kayla acknowledges that the area presently called Vancouver is within the traditional, ancestral, unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and səl̓ilwətaɁɬ təməxʷ (Tsleil-Waututh) nations. As a descendant of settlers, they recognize the past and ongoing dispossession and displacement of Indigenous peoples. Within their own work, they aim to foster an inclusive framework and are dedicated to learning how to practice solidarity.