Photos by Sofia Torres
My name is Sofia Torres. I was born in Mexico City in 1987, but have moved countless times since then. I’m currently based in Southern California, doing some freelance graphic design and taking pictures.
I have enjoyed photography since I was a kid, but started focusing on it more seriously during college, where I majored in Studio Art. I was studying the strange representations of wild animals that exist in commercial products such as cleaning product packaging and toys – and making sculptures that dealt with those ideas, using found objects and raw materials such as soap and fur.
Although I didn’t start incorporating those specific themes into my photography until more recently, that kind of structured, abstract thinking has always been an important aspect of my work and, to some extent, informs the way I approach photography – but I do not plan most of my shots.
There’s a way I feel when something seems like a shot. I’m learning that it’s some mixture of awe and unfamiliarity. Usually I will walk/ride my bike/drive by something and think, “that’s neat, but it creeps me out a little.” Those are, to varying degrees, the emotions I’m interested in. That’s when I take the picture.
