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Agostina Cerullo is a nomad photographer originally from Argentina, who spends her time between Spain, London and New York. Blending nostalgia with warmth and a touch of drama, Agostina’s photographic style showcases the interplay between light and shadow, in a cinematic way, capturing the essence of moments filled with personal relations, closeness, and silence, as well as the complexities of growth, youth, love and grief.
Intuition and improvisation are at the chore of her work, where the essence of the moment takes center stage. It’s in these unscripted, unguarded moments that she finds her inspiration, allowing her to create images that resonate with authenticity.
Within her repertoire, Agostina is particularly drawn to the world of portraiture, crafting powerful and evocative compositions. Her candid photography is a testament to her sense of perspective and composition, capturing the natural beauty of fleeting moments.
Beyond still photography, Agostina explores the realms of art installation and experimental videos, infusing her visual storytelling with the rhythm and energy of sound and visual sequencing.
Thank you for joining us. As you probably know, I am a big fan of your work, especially your books, which was my first introduction to you. You have been working on a new project that I am very excited to hear about. Could you share more information about your new series?
I am currently working on a new handmade accordion double-sided photo book, similar to my last one but with a twist: it features three different ways of opening, each revealing a unique story. The journey begins with the cover photograph showing two shadows split in half, setting the stage for an exploration of identity and introspection post-separation.
The front of the book is divided in half and opens from the center, revealing the inside, where photographs on the left interact with those on the right, exploring themes of identity loss and discovery. It includes intimate self-portraits and depictions of spaces that evoke distance and emptiness. The exterior of the book unfolds further, with two additional openings. The second opening, from the left, tells a story of loss, grief, pain, silence, and ultimately acceptance. The third opening, from the right, reveals a narrative of love, discovery, passion, joy, and hope. Both sections feature intimate photographs.
The design is intricate and interactive, stretching out to 15 feet when fully unfolded, becoming an installation where viewers can walk around and see through both sides. The stories seamlessly blend from beginning to end, with each photograph unfolding like frames in a movie. Turning my photos into tangible, interactive objects has become one of the things I enjoy the most in my practice, transforming storytelling into a physical experience.
I love the concept of the three journeys and how playfully you handle the sequence. I'm curious about what inspired you to create this project.
This project is deeply inspired by personal experiences and introspection. It serves as a visual expression of life’s complexities—moments of solitude, introspection, instability, anxieties, and the profound emotions of both loss and love. It reflects the fear of exploring the unknown, the acceptance of change against one’s will, and the newfound hope that emerges after intense emotional pain.
Through a combination of visual storytelling and a tactile, interactive format, I aim to encapsulate these feelings in a way that resonates personally with others. By blending visual narratives with spatial design, my goal is to initiate conversations about life's unpredictable journey, encouraging viewers to reflect on their own stories.
In what ways are photographs incorporated?
I use a combination of digital and film photography to capture moments from everyday life and personal reflection, including intimate portraits and atmospheric scenes. Each photograph plays a crucial role in constructing the book, whether it's integrated into unfolding pages that reveal diverse narratives or woven into the physical design. Every
image is meticulously placed to encourage viewer interaction and exploration, transforming images into narratives in physical form.
The handmade accordion format allows me to manipulate and shape the narrative physically. This tactile approach transforms the journey into an experience that can be touched, felt, and viewed from various angles and perspectives.
You’ve explored a similar style before. Could you introduce us to your previous book?
''Gone and Leaving'' is both an introspection, a projection of who I am into my surroundings as well as a documentation of the people in it, our relationships and connections. A contradiction in itself, as I feel uncertain about most things in life, I love and hate mostly everything, places, people, myself, there’s a lack of balance — intense feelings, either too much or not enough — a sense of dissociation, detachment, from myself and others.
Sometimes I reveal my subject’s identity, often I show only traces — a shadow, a silhouette, a part without the whole. Even as I try to freeze time, immortalize a moment, I acknowledge this cannot be done — all is ephemeral and will blur, will fade, will lose the colors of real life and take on the faded tones of nostalgia. There’s confusion in the images between warmth and longing, finding and losing — a bittersweetness. There’s tension between distance but somehow intimacy — maybe because others open up to me more than I to them, maybe because I am usually the listener. Perhaps that’s why I carry a camera: I’d rather be the observer than the observed.
The first half of the book can be read from front to back, and the second from back to front. To arrive you have to leave. To be lost you have to be found. Every end is a new beginning. And once it’s over, you can’t add new memories to that chapter of your life. But you can loop through the ones you’ve got.
Your skills as a photographer and storyteller are truly remarkable. Can you take us through your journey into photography? Also, how does analog photography influence your life?
Thank you, I really appreciate that! I got into photography by looking at family photos as a kid, when we were living in Buenos Aires my parents would buy disposable cameras and send them to the lab to get them developed, I was always so excited to pick them up and sift through the 4x6 prints and see what we got, it usually would be a surprise to me, as I wasn't the one photographing and I found through this process my love for looking at photographs and reliving memories, it was as if those moment never truly ended.
Photography is my passion, I simultaneously use it as a form of self-expression, through a cathartic and enjoyable process and to work through commissions and collaboratively with other artists.
How do you typically approach your creative process?
My creative process is spontaneous yet it is part of my routine and who I am as a person, the way I photograph is intuitive and usually unplanned, I like to capture natural fleeting moments and that is why I mostly always carry a camera with me. The process of editing my work, printing, designing and and making something out of it, it's incredibly chaotic and messy. I used to be unable to create as much as I would have liked because of my desire for perfection in my work and the cost of comparing it to the works of those I admired. Even though I still find it hard to accept mistakes, I have learned to appreciate the chaos and messiness throughout both my work and process. Through it, I also found my voice and style as an artist.
As a final question, are there any artists, not limited to photography, who have played a significant role in influencing your life and work?
Eight years ago, my best friend gifted me the book "Just Kids" which introduced me to Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe, two artists who have had a profound influence on me, growing as an artist. Reading their story was like reading about the life I dreamed of, but it was also very close to home because I could identify many parallels with it and my own experiences. That book gave me encouragement in that it showed that anyone can succeed as an artist, regardless of background, identity, or emotional state, provided they work hard, consistently, and move through life's changes. Patti's nature of documenting her life through words, photos and music resonated with me, as did Robbert's delicate yet powerful and controversial black and white photography.
It's funny since I always carry the book with me to whatever new country I move to as a reminder of these feelings of discovery and encouragement; and every time I meet an artist I recommend them to read it, believing that they will become as inspired as I did while reading it.
Thank you, Agostina, for joining us in this interview. To see more of her work, visit her website at www.agostinacerullo.com or follow her on Instagram at @forartssake.