SHOT | Article

In Agnès Varda’s farewell to filmmaking, she declares that ‘’if we opened people up, we’d find landscapes’’. Be it the whirling pool of ocean waters, the sculpture of a wing enclosed in ice, the mellow figure of a tree covered in snow or the imponent silhouette of a black mountain, Ángeles Peña allows us to glimpse into her soul and land through her suggestive photography.

Angeles Pena Shot Magazine Interview Issue13

Always inspired by the sublime power of nature, the photographer grew up amongst the Patagonia mountains, bearing witness and documenting the variegated character of such landscapes. By exploring the textures, pat-terns and inhabitants that represent the skin of this environment, she is able to capture in single instants the forces that are constantly moulting and conditioning our land, as well as the intimate relationships between these objects and their contexts. Her photography seems to challenge the motionless measurements of time and space, as it reflects the busting energy of hot springs, the passing of seasons, the misty songs of the sea meeting the coast and the melting mountain waters.

Angeles Pena for Shot Magazine Interview Issue13

By recording this relentless and inevitable transformation, Ángeles Peña portrays nature as a new born, alternative vision of what has been sur-passed through these rituals of passage: in her words, ‘’cold, water and ice are inexhaustible objects of study’’ as they are constantly transforming from one instant to the next and never preserve the same shape, pattern or form. Her project aims to represent not the landscape, wild and hostile in the eyes of man, but the path that humanity must walk to understand its insignificant role in perspective to the whole. Through her powerful landscapes, she intends to communicate how everything belongs to the rest, and to blow away their dichotomous nature by sewing together the sea and the sand, the piece and the place, the eye and the land.

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Photographer Meiji Nguyễn for Shot Magazine Interview Issue 13

Meiji Nguyen

The human body carries us throughout space, gathers the scars of time and coats our very being: it is the vessel of skin and flesh that transports us across dimensions, carrying feelings, intentions and experiences towards our destination. With such vision in mind, the photographer Meiji Nguyen presents a portrait of the human body in its various forms and purposes: whether this is a mother whose womb is heavy with human life, a ballet dancer stretching her tight muscles in an arabesque or someone standing poised behind a drooping hat. Skins are shiny and counterposed to minimal backgrounds, allowing for their freshness and radiance to emerge as a source of light. Bodies meet in perfectly measured embraces, merging into each other or fitting together as a jigsaw. Flamboyant settings merge with the clarity of poses and gestures, where these human bodies seem to emerge from backgrounds of artificial distraction. The true thing in these pictures is only skin: in an exploration of bodies, postures and gazes, human presence becomes the subject of these collections, where a unique language is forged with compelling expressiveness, yet does not require a single word. In the works of Nguyen, the human body takes flight, balances simplicity, dances with reality.

Maye Musk

A beauty icon, dietician and a woman with a plan: Maye Musk can boast a lifetime of success, beauty and adventure in many fields. Born in Canada, Maye lived in South Africa for many years before moving to the US, where she still resides and finds the comforts of a welcoming home. Coming from a background in nutrition studies, she has achieved two Masters of science which have enabled her to pursue a career with her nutrition business, through speaking, consulting, counselling, writing and media work, as well as becoming Ambassador for Big Green, a non-profit company cofounded by her son Kimbal Musk to teach people how to grow food and eat better. As a mother of three children, nothing has stopped her from working hard for her dreams. In her words, ‘I have never told my kids ‘’You’ve got to work hard’’. I just worked hard, and they followed my example’: this has led her to become an inspiration for their projects and work ethos, as well as making her a proud mother due to their extraordinary achievements. In her book ‘A Woman Makes A Plan’, Maye imparts practical advice by drawing from her life experience on how to change one’s life through the choices they are able to make. Here she focuses particularly on career, where the harder one works, the luckier one gets; on family, as the people one loves go their own way; and on health, claiming there is no magic pill. According to her, by making room for discovery, but always being prepared for the unexpected, one can live a life of adventure and excitement. Having pursued a successful career as a supermodel since a very young age, she has become one of the first models who can claim to have had four billboards in Times Square in her 60s, as well as becoming the oldest covergirl in her 70s. By defeating the previous standards within the fashion industry, Maye has established herself as the face of a new beauty ideal which does not wilt with the passing of time, but rather keeps flourishing. ‘Ageing doesn’t scare me at all’, she claims, ‘you can handle the bumps each year’. In this interview, the ‘woman with a plan’ converses with Shot Magazine to give space to some reflections on her life, values and future.

Gabriele Galimberti

The Italian poet Giovanni Pascoli wrote that within us all lives a small child, with an everlasting sense of wonder which allows them to touch the world with awe and imagination. Whilst we grow older, they stay young; whilst our voices rust in time, their clear sound sings with the chime of a bell. As we struggle to hear the voice of this little child, we must not forget that what brings us all together is the fact we have been one ourselves. These photographs present a glimpse into the life of children all over the world, in an exploration of their favourite toys and means of play. In this encounter, the renowned photographer Gabriele Galimberti talks to us about his project ‘Toy Stories’, walking through his own childhood, projects and visions for the future.

Omer Ga'ash

As the human skin merges with the surface of the earth, new landscapes are forged: the human body does not merely stand in contrast with its surroundings, standing with arrogant will, but rather blends with its environment and becomes an organic part of it. Cradled at the feet of a tree, resting within the bed of a dried river, sprawled upon the cover of a warm desert or curved over the golden stalks of an open field: bodies are able to blend into the colours, movements and shapes of their environment, adapting to circumstances. Through the poetic imagery of the photographer Omer Ga’ash, an exploration of the naked bodies of women and men is undertaken against the background of natural spaces. The environment becomes a place where human presence can be more than just detrimental, pollutant, dangerous: it is graceful, fluid, natural.

Angeles Peña

Inner Landscapes