Todd Jason Ritondaro
Todd Jason Ritondaro is a photographer and multidisciplinary artist who has traveled to East Africa for 14 years. He leads intimate, art-forward safari retreats in Kenya that partner with community-run conservancies, ensuring each stay supports wildlife and local livelihoods. Working primarily on film and extending his work with charcoal and ink,
Todd teaches a slow, analog approach that centers on presence - seeing with attention and intention, letting images emerge rather than be chased. Days blend fieldcraft with sketchbook studies, journaling, and simple breath-led resets; evenings are for edit reviews, conversation, and stars. His framework, A Certain Alchemy, underpins the ongoing project Expose for the Shadows: Photography as Inner Work, inviting guests to make honest pictures that carry the felt sense of place. The result is an aesthetic, ethical safari—romance grounded in reality—where time in the bush directly contributes to conservation and community well-being.
Drawing heavily on his influences from renaissance paintings and classic cinema, Todd’s photography evokes a strong sense of story and place through artistic composition and use of natural light. His transportive photographs ignite a sense of nostalgia, while aiming to capture the soul of a destination and it’s people through the grand, the quotidian, and poetic small moments in-between.
A graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts Film and TV program, he has also directed commercials, branded content, documentary, and short films and worked with some of the biggest luxury brands in the world.
He lives between Europe, East Africa, and the American Southwest.
