Metanoia

What pieces or projects have you been working on lately?
In substance, I’ve been working on the importance of reclaiming the female gaze: returning to capture images from a complicit rather than dominant eye, from experience rather than from the fragmentation of the subject in front of the camera. In form, I’ve been intervening in my images with accompanying texts that support and reinforce them.

What did you learn (or unlearn) while working on them?
I’ve learned—and I’m still learning—how deeply internalized the hegemonic gaze and the dominant narratives promoted by social media are. It’s difficult to peel away layer after layer and realize that, in a way, your own gaze is still conditioned. It’s a process, and each time I feel I’m getting closer to something that feels consistent with who I am and with my growth.

What words, ideas or emotions were going through your head?
Multidimensionality, complexity, volume, depth, detail, expansion, sincerity, honesty, softness, vulnerability, decentralization, compassion.

Were there any conversations, movies, music, or books that made their way into that work?
Absolutely everything. Every conversation, film, song, or book that reaches me inspires me, whether as a guide toward what I want to move closer to or as a place I want to move away from.

What's been the most difficult thing you've faced recently in your creative process?
Not letting myself be swept away by the tyranny of trends. Resisting the temptation of immediacy and artificial intelligence. Working on the patience that human creative processes require. Going deeper into my ideas, my interactions, and my texts, and not wanting everything to be automatic or fast.

What is your favorite restaurant and what do you recommend we order?
¡Plantasia! The mushroom dumplings, the truffle cream udon, the pad see ew, and the pistachio ice cream.

If your life were a movie this month, what would it be called and who would write the soundtrack?
Metanoia. Soundtrack by Yukimi (Little Dragon).

Recommend one or more artists you follow who inspire you, and tell us what you like most about their work or their way of working.
I think I periodically become obsessed with different artists from different disciplines, but the ones who remain are Alyson Provax, Mona Kuhn, Jenny Holzer, Uta Barth, Sally Nixon, Lena Dunham, Nan Goldin, Elinor Carucci, Ana Mendieta, Ryan McGinley, Duane Michals, among others.

Others I’ve had very present lately are: Lilia Carlone, Vivien Bendlin, Arielle Bobb Willis, Lisa Sorgini, Andrea Costantini, Delfina Carmona, Ainhoa Ezkurra, Chantal Convertini, Adina Salome Harnischfeger, Nanda Hagenaars, Lucía Lijtmaer, Jacob Aue Sobol, Catia Simões and Bettina Pittaluga.

What attracts me most to their work is their ability to observe and portray—photographically or textually—the everyday with a nostalgia that reaches my soul. Also their break with gender and beauty canons and stereotypes, and the rawness and sincerity of their images and texts. Their work feels deeply real, and that’s a bit of what I’m looking for in life.