In the times we live in, being an artist feels almost wrong
Researching the self - is a project that can take a lifetime. Through self-portraiture, Rita Lino created a comprehensive visual diary, a merge of intuitive, artistic, and staged photography. The exploration of the self, of the body, the study of sexuality and femininity reveals some deep-rooted truths. The perception changes from the well-accepted vision of oneself to expose an additional layer of the personality with undertones from the subconscious.
The state of being lonely in a professional sphere eventually leads Rita to a determination to expand the boundaries and start collaborating with other creatives, contributing to and learning from the process. This journey is destined to become a new book and an exhibition, a current work in progress, Rita speaks briefly about, at the end of the interview.
Rita Lino is a photographer who mainly focuses on personal projects as a means to explore herself, her inner drives, instincts, finally translating it to art statements. Born in Portugal, in a small village, at the age of seventeen, Rita decides to move to the North of the country to pursue studies towards a Bachelor’s in Design. In this conversation, just before the second lockdown in Berlin, where she currently lives and works, Rita tells us about the unique experience which led her to discover herself in photography. This path enabled her to realize her goals and reach a state in which she’s content with her profession. Although, as Rita explains, “There's another side to this story. It was not all romantic or an American Dream kind of a situation, at least for me.” We stop to ponder on the process of releasing Entartete, her second book, and the most crucial project so far. A book that shaped her self-apprehension and became an eye-opener to see the previously ignored beauty in herself.
‘Coming from the South, from a very small village, you just don’t have a choice, you got to leave if you have this need to learn and explore.’
I Am
Hi Rita, we’re happy to have this conversation with you! You were actually born in the south of Portugal, studied in Barcelona, and currently, you live and work in Berlin. Why did you make a choice to move to a different country?
I was born in the South of Portugal, in the village of a few thousand people. I went to study in the North of Portugal, in an art school, when I was only seventeen. Later, I moved to Barcelona. Then I lived for a few years in London. I ended up here in Berlin, where I live for the past eight years. It’s been a while! Time flies.
In the beginning, when I was younger, it was, honestly, not a choice to stay in Portugal, unfortunately. It was never an option to stay there and do what I loved the most. Back then, it was not about photography; it was about exploring, experimenting, and learning about the art world. I was always more interested in multimedia and new media than in fine art. Later, photography became my main passion.
Coming from the South, from a very small village, you just don’t have a choice, you got to leave if you have this need to learn and explore. If I stayed in Portugal, I would end up working to pay my bills, time would have passed, and I would still be working in some other profession - just because the struggle is real there. My choice was to create an opportunity for myself.
‘Sometimes I even think that my gaze and my photography feel like that of a male. When you look and you think the way I do - it’s very masculine. Though, I'm learning that today, it's also considered very feminine.’
Exploration of Sexuality
You have a wide range of works, which is self-portraiture. One of the most prominent themes is the exploration of the body and sexuality. Let’s speak about that for a moment.
My work is, and has always been, about self-portraits, even when it’s not me in front of the camera. Self-portraits are very personal. It’s a vision. When I’m not photographing myself, I always try to put myself in someone else’s shoes. It might sound extremely egocentric, but sometimes when I work with models for commercial projects, I see myself in the positions I ask them to take.
I started self-portraits because I didn't have many people around me. No model and no friend would pose for me the way I wanted, which was the reason I worked on self-exploration via researching photography, poses, and the body. It came from curiosity, but not curiosity of my sexuality. Sexuality was a part of my personality. These days I'm older, and that energy is becoming something else. It’s present, and sometimes I even think that my gaze and my photography feel like that of a male. When you look and you think the way I do - it’s very masculine. Though, I'm learning that today, it's also considered very feminine.
What did you discover about yourself from those two distinct prisms: a personal and a professional? Is this experience a liberating one as connected to the way the photographs are received?
A professional perspective includes both a commercial angle and an exhibition angle (when an institution pays you to develop a body of work). This liberating experience is becoming more real and tangible than before. It takes time. It took me fifteen years or even more. Liberation in personal and professional spheres is finally coming along, holding hands, because I'm owning it. My photographs are received, thankfully, well. But it did take time to mix personal and professional to become Rita Lino with one website, one Instagram account, and become the person I am today.
It took time, not because I was ashamed or not sure... or maybe because I wasn't sure or I was trying to figure out how to go into this world. I guess, for some people, it’s easier. For me, it wasn't, because I didn’t have a person, a friend, to look out at. None of my closest friends are photographers. When people come to me, no matter which type of photography we are talking about, I know I can't be who I am without holding back. If I hold back, I am aware of that, and the other person is also very aware of that. It’s very transparent, and being transparent is very liberating.
‘I’m relieved looking at this trip of my life. It’s emotional, but at the same time, it’s relieving, as I realize how honest I’ve been in the way I express myself.’
Entartete
To continue the topic of self-exploration, you released the book Entraterte, the result of 10 years of work, a visual diary capturing your self-portraits.
My second book - Entartete - was an extremely important one for me. I’m very proud of it. As an object, it looks fantastic; I wouldn't change anything about it: it’s heavy, thick, dark, and honest. It’s a bruise of a book, it’s a punch in the face (also to the people who bought the book).
It’s ten years of snaps, of series. It’s not about one thing specifically or one aesthetics, rather, it’s a diary, and it took me three years to make it. It was almost impossible because I was always adding more stuff. Of course, I didn’t do it alone, it was way too much work, way too personal.
When I put together Entartete, and I looked the first time at the PDF draft, I remember a publisher saying, “You better grab a shot of whiskey because you're gonna be shocked.” Sometimes, we have this vision of ourselves, especially when it’s personal like that. I was young (I’m 34 now, when I put this out, I was 26). You create this image about yourself that you want to believe in. I know I'm a bit crazy, a bit wild, that I have this dark side, but there is a certain light, funny aspect in my photography, and I always wanted to see the bright side: a bit romantic and melancholic. I wanted to be a girl.
And looking at the book... I was shocked. It was none of that. As Eugenie Shinkle said, “Entartete is a yellow-purple bruise of a book.” It took me a few days to realize how aggressive I was with myself. I was never soft, I never portrayed my beauty, I never tried it. And it was beautiful because it was the first time I stopped for maybe one or two years. I looked at it, I finished it, promoted it, and I traveled. I did a few book signings, and I met wonderful people. This book was a turning point in my career; it put me in a certain small niche of photobooks, festivals, and book stores. It was very important, and it made me stop and look back. It was fascinating, almost like going to therapy in a most aggressive, brutal, and honest way.
If you were to continue the book with Part 2 of another 10 years, how would your perspective shift?
I’m relieved looking at this trip of my life. It’s emotional, but at the same time, it’s relieving, as I realize how honest I’ve been in the way I express myself. By now, I've grown and changed, but the passion is still there. There is growth, but also honesty and brutality, the rawness of it - it’s still there. If I do part two, it would be less of a scream or less instinctive in a way because instinct is already there. After all these years, I managed to tame my instinct, I managed to be gentle and put more thought into it.
What is the most memorable picture from the one’s included in the book, what is the memory connected to it?
There are a lot of memorable images, as you can imagine. The book contains different periods of my life: cities, boyfriends, family issues, and stages. It is a book of memory, it is a diary. These photos, a lot of them, are snaps, but they are also staged: a creation, an outfit, a corner of the room that I chose. So, those are staged, but at the same time pretty honest. I’m not controlling anything in there.
‘Open your eyes and work your ass off. When you think that you’re tired, forget about that. Work more and live for that.’
Commissioned Projects
What was your first serious commission work when you realized photography is a profession that can pay for itself?
It’s tough for me to talk about this one because there are so many layers to the world that have changed so much. I don’t want to sound negative or a pessimist, but I have a feeling that photography, as a profession, as a pure art form, is going down the hill for many reasons. From fashion to art... giving advice is really hard. I would say the basics: stay true to yourself but sometimes that won’t be possible so adapt and learn. Instead of fighting it just take it as a process to learn from. I think if you want to make money with photography, you gotta bend, you gotta learn, you gotta fight with clients and galleries. Eventually, it becomes more political or business-like than art. Just be open and evolve from there.
About photography as a professional that pays for itself, it’s also very cliche what I’m gonna say, but I guess photography chose me in a way. I studied mainly design, got a Bachelor’s in Design Multimedia focusing on video and photo, and then I did a Master’s in Editorial Design. I wanted to make books and magazines. Then, I did a post-graduation in Photography but not as a photographer; I studied project: writing it up, conceptualizing - creating projects.
I always have been photographing, doing my own thing, expressing myself in all ways possible. Commercial photography came by surprise. The first magazine, which paid me for an editorial (which I couldn’t believe) was Vice Magazine Barcelona, in 2008. They said, “You can do whatever you want.” Until today, I remember how good it felt, like the biggest award I could ever get. They came to me at the beginning of the internet, and Flickr. Tumbler didn’t even exist, or if it existed, I didn't have one. Today people work for their own Instagram, they have a huge platform. Back then, I didn’t have one. Flickr was for photographers and amateurs, not for magazine editors. That was the first time anyone ever paid me. I remember they paid quite well. I know they have the fame that they don’t pay, but I only had a good experience with them.
It’s a snowball. Then another magazine happened, and another one. Before, there were fewer photoshoots. Today, everything is fast: fast fashion, fast photography, fast concepts. My experience is that those things were paid for, not much money, but paid. And there was one year, I did quite a lot of editorials for magazines in Barcelona, and then smaller brands came to me.
There's another side to this story. It was not all romantic or an American Dream kind of a situation, at least for me. While I was doing those editorials, it didn’t pay for my living, I had to work. That money came as a bonus and helped me buy more equipment or film. I had a job, it was the beginning of e-commerce, I was 23 and had a job as a photo-retoucher in a big corporation. Can you believe that? Where I am now, came with so much work and sweat.
Being a retoucher at an e-commerce platform is as boring as you can imagine. I had no experience in a photo studio and professional equipment. I worked in this place for about eight months. I was working my ass off. I was learning constantly, seeing these photographers working with big umbrellas, tripods, and lights. I was just looking until one day someone got sick and had to be covered, so I volunteered to be a photographer, and I learned how to work with this equipment.
This is the truth about how I began: touching on romantic and very practical sides to the story. Later on in life, it became just a romantic side, so I'm a very lucky girl, I guess. I do what I do, and it pays my bills.
Looking back at it, what are some tips you would provide to the emerging photographers or yourself back then?
It is hard. A tip I can give is: if you want to make money go for it, go commercial, do the big jobs, follow the trends, have fun, and make that big money. If you are an artist, someone with a vision (not that the other one doesn’t have a vision) if you have a specific, very personal, vision, you will have to work a lot. I advise you to photograph every day, I don't mean taking a camera and clicking the button. Photography is a practice. You have to practice every day or every week: looking at your photos, archiving them, photographing, scanning, saving on your hard drive - that’s extremely important for the future.
Living from photography is not just taking photos. There are so many jobs that you can have. You can be an editor, an art director, a professor, a tutor, you can give workshops and make books. I think these days, it’s not that you have one profession and do only one thing to make a living. Open your eyes and work your ass off. When you think that you’re tired, forget about that. Work more and live for that.
Controversy
Some of our work might be considered as controversial or provocative, which is one of the ways to raise awareness on certain topics and move the conversation forward. What are some of the topics you’re interested in exploring and perhaps changing the conscious behavior of the people about those?
Controversy has always been a part of my life. If my work and photography are not controversial, it’s because I'm not doing a good job, for me at least. If I please everyone, I’m not doing a good job. Before all the online feminist movements, I guess I would be doing a big part of the job by just being true to myself, speaking my mind and not following mainstream guides or being brainwashed. It is about being a woman, not in the eyes of society but my own eyes. Feminism, sexuality, art, and why we do art, especially today, is complicated.
In Germany, they just announced the second lockdown, it feels so hopeless... Why am I doing this when I should be doing something else? I guess this is also a controversy. Doing art, personal projects - today, it’s extremely controversial. I’m interested in that, and I don't tend to stop it. It keeps me alive, and it keeps my mornings brighter even when they are very dark. It’s a constant fantasy of it. If I keep the fantasy alive during those hard times, I think that’s already being a controversy.
In the times we live in, being an artist feels almost wrong (at least for me), but I am realizing that it's important to use this platform like WÜL to join people together (photographers in this case) for important conversations about ways to survive and to continue the nurturing process because without that many of us are lost.
‘I’m always alone, I work alone, I photograph myself: I’m a photographer and a model. If I’m in the darkroom - I'm alone; In the studio - I'm alone. After Entartete, I decided I wanted to do a bunch of collaborations.’
Video Projects
You took part in the creation of the movie How to Become Nothing for the musician Paulo Furtado. Could you tell about this experience which is very different from the rest of your work?
After putting out Entartete and promoting it while also working on fashion and commissioned projects, I stopped a bit my work. By 'stopped', I don’t mean I decided not to do anything anymore, rather stopped working alone, constantly. This job that I do, this person I became, is extremely lonely. I do like it. Lonely, perhaps, is not a correct word. I’m always alone, I work alone, I photograph myself: I’m a photographer and a model. If I’m in the darkroom - I'm alone; In the studio - I'm alone. After Entartete, I decided I wanted to do a bunch of collaborations, learn from other people, open my horizons, and explore as if I were a kid. Go for it and try something else.
How to Become Nothing is a film - it was a collaboration between me, Paulo Furtado, and Pedro Maia. It’s a project between me (a photographer), a musician, and a movie director. I spent three years just getting more info, learning, reading, collaborating, and taking workshops about photography and video. I traveled, I tried to get into all the things. This film was a crazy experience. We started it a year after Entartete was out. It was a month of filming in the desert of Nevada and California: low budget, three people in the car, a lot of film - more than food. A lot of ideas, tears, and emotions were exchanged. It was extremely beautiful, and it became three things. A movie that was presented in several festivals in the world: in Europe, Asia, South Africa, South America. We wanted to finish with the book and a soundtrack of the movie. Last year, I released the How to Become Nothing book, in which photography is mine and music is Paulo Furtado's. So it's a book and a vinyl. It took a lot of time to do it. We started the project in 2016, the filming at the end of 2016, and only last year, in 2019, I put it out. It’s me trying to tame the instinct, go back, and have time to look at things and explore.
Between these years, I did a workshop with Antoine d'Agata. That was insane and almost a life changer. It was extremely important for me to do that. The final result of the workshop was the zine called Kingdom. Between Entartete and now, I've been photographing men and not myself. I needed to get out of my comfort zone and learn. I can’t say that I’m back to the roots by now. Those experiences are extremely different from the rest of my work because I’m never alone, I'm always with people and always sharing. Even if I have my responsibility as in How to Become Nothing, in which I wasn’t just a photographer, I wrote the script, I did the camera - I’m all over the place, extremely multitasking. There's this energy I have to share with other people.
Do you plan to take part in other collaborations, including video projects?
I put out Kingdom as we had to get some budget to produce the book. The zine was a collaboration with Stolen Books from Portugal, a publisher, and Ricardo Passaporte, an artist. Ricardo added all the designs for it. It’s been a lot of collaborations, and it’s been fantastic to work with other people and leave my comfort zone, be out there and have someone to tell me to shut up. There were a lot of men around me, while in my life, I'm pretty much surrounded by women. Besides those personal projects, I've been constantly collaborating with fashion brands, some more conceptual and artsier, some more commercial, but I was always learning and going for it. I spent these last years collaborating mainly, and I want to do it more. Now, again, I need to go inwards and take all that I’ve learned and put it into something new.
Upcoming Projects
What are your plans for this year? What are you working on right now?
Well, this year is pretty much over. My plans for this year are related to what I'm working on right now. I’m taking all these last years of learning and putting it into a solo project. Not sure I want to talk about it... I’ve been working on this project for over a year, I had it in my head for at least three years. It will become a book that I will work with APE (Art Paper Editions) and, hopefully, an exhibition.
I’m usually not that interested in doing exhibitions, but this time I really want to do it. I wasn't that interested in exhibitions, as for me they have always been ephemeral, with a short lifetime. I like to have the object, I love books, that's where I come from... For me, an exhibition is a bunch of photos on the wall. I did a few, but I don't get excited about it. It’s so much work and so much money you spend on it.
But for this new project, I would love to have an exhibition. I’m actually looking for a partner or a gallery. This project takes photography as a medium, but it’s more than that. It's a conceptual project called Replica (the title is a working progress, but I'm pretty sure it’s close to a final one). I’m going back to self-portraits. Something I can say is that I’m very interested right now in 3D, not 3D animation, rather integration of video and photography. It’s a full fantasy I'm trying to create, and that’s why I want an exhibition. I would like to create a full room of Frankensteins. Not sure when this will be out as everything is very delayed. This year, I'm working on this project, some fashion projects I’m very happy about which I can share with you in two months.
