Joshua Paul and the Power Of IntenT
STORY | Karl Noakes
Photography | Joshua Paul
At the sharpest edge of motorsport, everything is built to go faster. In Formula One, performance is measured in thousandths, decisions in milliseconds, and progress is relentless.
Joshua Paul works in the opposite direction. He is the only America-based full-time photographer granted Formula One accreditation across an entire season. While most operate at the limits of modern digital speed, Paul has developed a distinct approach — one rooted in patience, intent, and an analog way of seeing in an increasingly digital world.
Photo by: Mario Renzi
That approach extends beyond the tools in his arsenal. Paul moves comfortably between modern digital systems and cameras that predate the sport itself.
“Equipment doesn’t make the photograph — intent does,” as Paul puts it.
At times, that means stepping trackside with a 100-year-old, large-format camera fitted with vintage brass lenses — tools that demand time, precision, and total commitment to the moment. Not the most obvious choice, perhaps, but that’s rather the point.
That same intent shapes his work beyond the circuit. Driven by a desire to explore motorsport differently, Paul launched Lollipop Magazine — a self-published project focused on Formula One and built around a slower, more considered visual narrative.
This perspective has not gone unnoticed. Through work such as Mobil 1’s Drivers Journal, Paul has been commissioned to document motorsport across its most demanding and distinctive settings — Pikes Peak, Sebring, Formula One, including work with Red Bull Racing, and events such as Luftgekühlt 9 and FAT International’s Ice Race. These efforts have helped him build a body of work that values atmosphere, craft, and emotion as much as access and speed.
This approach carries into Paul’s portrait work. In a paddock defined by schedules and seconds, Paul creates space—however brief—to photograph drivers who rarely stop moving. The process is quiet and efficient, producing images that feel deeply considered rather than frantically captured. This is not nostalgia. It is pursuit.
His philosophy is simple: the medium does not make the photograph; the outcome does. Film, digital, or otherwise, are only as powerful as the intent behind them. It’s an analog mindset applied across formats — where constraint sharpens creativity and process matters as much as result. Where others rely on speed and volume, he focuses on images that hold attention, carry weight, and provoke a response.
For Paul, that philosophy is best captured by a quote he often returns to. Legendary art director Alexey Brodovitch famously challenged photographers like Richard Avedon and Irving Penn with a simple directive: “Astonish me.” It’s a standard Paul carries forward into every project, always striving to create the ultimate expression of speed, precision, and consequence.
Whether capturing the controlled chaos of a race start or the quiet choreography of a car pushed to the grid, Paul seeks moments that transcend documentation — slowing down a sport defined by speed to reveal something more enduring.
Not every frame needs to be made quickly. Some need to be made deliberately.
For more of Joshua’s work, see Lollipop Magazine (lollipop-gp.com) or @lollipopmagazine on Instagram.
