Andreea Preda

Madrid, Spain

flickr website

Let me point this out: you really seem to love portraiture! What is it that you enjoy about taking portraits?

I like taking pictures of people, but it’s not like I want to catch their souls or something like that. They’re more like interchangeable figures, at least most of the time. That’s also why I take that many self-portraits: usually, when I don’t have someone else I want to take a picture of around, I end up being my own model. Maybe it’s also the thought of creating continuity throughout all those portraits that makes me enjoy taking portraits the most. And this can happen even if the models are very different; it’s the moment when style shows up regardless of the subjects in the pictures.

There is some romantic notion, and a bit of thoughtfulness to your pictures. Do you catch your friends/models in such moments, or do you deliberately seek to present them in this way?

Both, I think. Sometimes those romantic and melancholic moments simply happen. Then I take pictures of them, because I want to keep them forever, as images and sometimes as places, as well. Sometimes a person or just the mood I’m in make me want to compose an image that doesn’t exist spontaneously, but comes out of my imagination, too, of course.

Do you make "old-fashioned" photo albums of your friends and family? 

No, but I always think of organizing my prints in some way…

If you had to give away one camera, would it be your digital or analogue one?

I don’t have a digital camera that I use for artistic purposes anymore. I have a really small one that I carry around when travelling just to take pictures of everything I see so that my parents can see how my trip was.

Why do you think do we sometimes connect a lot of emotions to pictures, when they're in fact just a print or digital image?

Because some of them remain for a long time printed on our brains, just like memories. Sometimes pictures help our memory to remember and sometimes we make up stories inspired by them.

If you could take somebody with you on a trip somewhere far solely to take pictures, who would it be?

I don’t like to take pictures of strangers, so it would be one of my pretty friends.

For you, is photography a solitary activity, or does it involve being in company and helps to connect to other persons?

I think it’s a rather solitary activity, because most of the process takes place in my mind.  Sometimes I like to share my ideas, my projects, but not too much. I prefer showing the final result so as to not create expectations I might not be able to live up to.

If you had all the money and possibilities you needed, which of your dreams you would want to fulfil first?

I don’t have really big, impossible dreams; I just want to live my life to the fullest, and not miss what it has to offer. So if I had the money to achieve my everyday little dreams and get rid of my everyday little problems I’d be happy, maybe.

Do you like to work in terms of projects, or do you prefer to simply collect and take pictures on the way?

So far, I’ve been doing the last thing but I recently discovered how important projects are if you want to be taken seriously as an artist. People like to see that there’s a lot of thinking behind everything you do, they seem to appreciate that more than just spontaneous work. From now on I’ll try to work like that if I can.

Is there a movie of which you liked the imagery more than the actual story line?

This applies to all movies by Michelangelo Antonioni.

Where will you or would you like to be this autumn?

I’ll still be in Madrid, but next autumn I’ll try to be somewhere else.

Quoting Sylvia Plath, taking pictures of many women and girls. Take a look at her work!