About Me

Boozhu (Hello) – My name is Marcella Hadden and I am the owner and photographer at Niibing Giizis (Summer Moon) Photography Studio located in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan.  (serving Saginaw Chippewa Tribal Community, Mt. Pleasant and Midland areas).

My photography of families, newborns, teens, pets, wedding and boudoir is specific to each client. Each setting has its own unique and individual qualities. My job is to capture the beauty and create a lasting image that can be enjoyed as a physical or digital image. 

Capturing the candidness of each setting, whether it be nature, people or pets, is the legacy of my work and will speak for generations to come.

Featured Work

Titled “Boontak! (Stop it!): Stolen Daughters of Turtle Island” (an Indigenous name for the North American continent), the show “seeks to raise awareness about the atrocities of the MMIWG”—Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls—“crisis impacting Tribal communities,” according to a statement.

Featuring 94 portraits of Native women and girls, including U.S. Representative Deb Haaland, who offered to stand in for the missing and deceased, “Boontak” debuted virtually on Friday, September 25, and will remain on view at the Ziibiwing Center of Anishinabe Culture & Lifeways in Mount Pleasant through next spring.

Saginaw Chippewa photographer Marcella Hadden collaborated with granddaughter Christina Benz to take the portraits over the course of three months in 2019, reports Cole Waterman for MLive. In addition to the pair’s photographs, the exhibition features original paintings, drawings, sculptures, graphic art and beaded medallions. (Davis-Marks, 2020)

“

“I didn’t choose the subject of the photographs—it chose me, and the community chose it,” Hadden tells the Art Newspaper’s Gabriella Angeleti. “I put out a call on social media and asked women in the community if they would like a free photograph in order to raise awareness for MMIWG, and got an overwhelming response. I shot more than 100 portraits, including one of … Haaland, who has been at the forefront of the new [legislation].”
avatar
Marcella Hadden

Featured Video

Davis-Marks, I. (2020, October 06). Portrait Project Memorializes Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women. Retrieved December 19, 2020, from https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/exhibit-honors-missing-and-murdered-indigenous-women-180975985/