An Homage to the Tourist Snapshot: Photos of Landmarks with a Difference by Pep Ventosa

Your photography is very artistic and unique. How did you develop this style?

Thank you. I’m fascinated by the photographic image and the different forms it can take. I like to experiment with photography to create images not singularly recorded by the camera, photographs made of photographs. The style has grown from experimenting with ways to combine and blend different photographs into a new single image, an image that represents the subject in ways not seen before.

Road to Monument Valley

What do you hope your pieces say to the viewer?

My hope is that they draw the viewer’s attention and interest to know what they’re looking at, a curiosity in something new and intriguing, something that captivates for its forms and colors and reminds them of well known subjects.

Venice

How do you choose the subjects of your photographs? If you can, talk us through the process you go through when choosing and taking a shot.

The Collective Snapshot series explores my interest in the photographic image and its history. The project is an homage to the snapshot, the most popular form of photography. I work with photographs of famous landmarks taken by tourists to create new images that symbolize the classic tourist snapshot, the quintessential travel photograph. I go through thousands of snapshots and ultimately select a few dozen to use as raw material to begin layering and blending together to create a new image; a new representation of the landmark.

Tower Bridge, London

It’s obvious you have travelled a lot. What has been your favourite place to photograph and why?

Maybe Venice, for its immense and concentrated beauty, the decay of its old buildings, the exquisite colors, the canals and the lack of cars… it is in itself like being inside an old photograph.

Colosseum, Rome

What inspires your work?

Lots of things, but mainly my curiosity for photographs. I believe all photographs are interesting. The photographic image holds some magic, some power that captivates us. I love to look at photographs, all kinds. Other than that, music, literature, movies, travel, walking on the beach or talking to my wife. Inspiration comes from observation and curiosity.

Taj Mahal, India

If you could take photographs anywhere in the world, where would it be and why?

I’d like to take a road trip in Japan and go through side roads and old cities and towns. I got intrigued by the culture of Japan from reading Haruki Murakami’s books.

You can find more of Pep’s fantastic photographs from the ‘Collective Snapshot’ series and others on his site.

Do you take a lot of photos when you travel? Let us know in the comments below!