The Mysterious World Of Montserrat Diaz Photography

In the following piece, Spanish surreal photographer Montserrat Diaz talks about her journey in the world of photography and how she gets inspired to create her magical portraits.

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I was born in Spain in 1976 but I currently reside in Milan: This is a city that I love. It’s where I studied and graduated with a degree in Foreign Languages and Literature but eventually ended up as a self-taught photographer.

I have always had a great passion for art: I grew up surrounded by paintings and mirrors in my parents’ shop and I initially expressed myself through painting. However, when I discovered photography in 2014, it became the medium through which I preferred to convey my inner world. I consider myself more of an artist than a photographer.

Since 2016, I have exhibited my works in group exhibitions and solo shows, both in Italy and abroad. My work has been published in several on-line magazines including ClickMagazine  and the Spanish Thalamus Magazine, and featured in Internet collections like Barbara Picci.

The idea that life and dreams are made of the same substance is at the heart of my work, and it is the soul of my images. The mechanism of photo-montage looks like the process of having (or rather) manufacturing a dream and, in the same way, I pick up the pieces of reality and put them back together in order to create new worlds and situations that would otherwise be impossible.

Normally the woman who appears in my images is me. The reason is that I have always tried to look into my inner-self in order to know myself, and I consider art the perfect medium for doing this.

I tend to use faded colors to emphasize the idea of life as a dream made up of elusive memories and sensations.

As with dreams, my images are full of symbolism: deserts, mirrors, animals… You will also find recurring symbols that represent an important part of me, my history and my thoughts.