Nailed It

What pieces or projects have you been working on lately?
I’m currently traveling and working around Australia, trying to understand people’s lives and document everyday life across the country, with its challenges and pleasures. I’ve been doing this for a year now, and I hope to continue documenting Australia for another one or two years. Before Australia, I was working on a similar project on my home island, with a special focus on land being sold and plundered by the government and on the immigration crisis. It’s a project I will return to when the time is right.

What did you learn (or unlearn) while working on them?
What I’ve learned is to accept that you can’t have everything or be everywhere, so you have to make the most of where you are in that moment and not let it slip away. It may sound very basic, but it becomes truly frustrating when you stop doing things out of fear. You have to learn to fully live an experience, even while being far from love. Love is everywhere—perhaps in a more ephemeral form, but it is still love. The process is truly slow, and you have to enjoy it. You have to understand the deeper purpose of sacrifice.

What words, ideas or emotions were going through your head?
Most of the time, I find myself comparing how different people spend their time depending on where they are, even in similar Western societies like Australia and Spain. For me, it often feels like things are always better in the place I’m visiting, but in reality that’s just an illusion created by the excitement of learning and seeing new things.

Were there any conversations, movies, music, or books that made their way into that work?
I would say that some '70s rock and roll and Western country music have become a kind of soundtrack in my head. It started during my first job in Australia, working at a bar in a recreational center in Kulin, a very small town in Western Australia. We used to play that music for the farmers and workers who often came to the center to play bowls and have a few beers. I started creating a playlist with the songs they liked the most, and I still listen to it during long drives through the country.

What's been the most difficult thing you've faced recently in your creative process?
I guess approaching people is always difficult, but lately I’ve been feeling pretty good about it. It’s like asking myself: who am I to ask this person for a photo, or even to take one without asking first? Either way, in my opinion, you have to do it; otherwise, you’re letting yourself down.

What is your favorite restaurant and what do you recommend we order?
I definitely have to say El Crusantero. It’s a local restaurant in the north of Tenerife, the island where I’m from. They serve puchero, escaldón, and arroz a la cubana, which is my favorite dish (I know it’s a kid’s dish and I don’t fucking care). But more than the food, it’s about what the place means to me. We celebrate my mother’s birthday there every year with the whole family. It’s a beautiful moment.

If your life were a movie this month, what would it be called and who would write the soundtrack?
Nailed It. And if I had to choose a soundtrack, it would be something like the soundtrack of True Detective (Season 1), by T-Bone Burnett and Nic Pizzolatto. A friend replied to one of my Instagram stories a few days ago saying that I look like I’m living in True Detective because of the things I’ve been uploading. And honestly, it makes sense. There’s definitely an amazing soundtrack behind it all, very connected to the kind of music I mentioned before.

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.
Being in Australia has led me to discover Australian photographers I really like, such as Adam Ferguson, Trent Parke and Narelle Autio. I love the way they capture and document Australia, and the respect they show for the Traditional Owners.

Recently, I started following Ximeng Tu, who is working on a project around his hometown in China that I find very inspiring. It’s incredible how his photos really make you feel the place. Then there’s Una rutina and David Sánchez, who are doing some wild street photography in Colombia. And of course, big names like Sakir Khader, with his black-and-white work in Palestine and Syria, and Boogie—honestly, everything he does is amazing.