"HipHoesía" & Film Photography: A Conversation with Artist Samir Gallego

Multidisciplinary artist Samir Gallego uses hip-hop, poetry and film photography to paint his own emotional landscape. Since our feature of his trip to Romania for the Around the World in Analogue series, Samir has worked through a couple of songs and also published a photo and poetry zine.

In this interview, we had the chance to ask Samir more questions about his film photography background, HipHoesía (poetry woven into hip-hop music), and how these three disciplines serve to express his unique view of the world.

Hi, Samir! Welcome back to the magazine. Can you tell us a little about yourself? How and when did you start shooting film?

Well, first I want to say hello to all the people who are reading this, thank you very much! My name is Samir Gallego, some people know me as Emci Rimas, HipHoesía artist (that's what I call the mix I make between hip-hop music with poetry), poet and photographer.

I am from Cali - Colombia, I have been living in the beautiful city of Barcelona and I have created and directed since 2014 a small festival called “Katharsis Festival”, an event of poetic hip-hop, poetry and photography.

I started shooting with film when I started my training as an art photographer in 2015. I didn't have the money to buy a digital camera, so a friend lent me her father's camera, a beautiful Pentax K1000. That's where my taste for film began. By the way, of all my classmates I was the only one who shot with film. I learned to choose better, to think and feel the image more.

What do you like most about film photography?

What I like most is the intimacy that it gives me. You know, in the end until I reveal it, it is still that intimate moment that I had and have frozen in time. That moment of intimacy sometimes reminds me of when I was a child and went fishing with my parents.

And I like the process of seeing the image appear. This is a moment that I value a lot in film photography, when you can finally see the negatives and when you make a contact sheet and start working on the prints.

What do you usually take photos of? Where do you get your inspirations for film photography?

I usually photograph what seems poetic to me and that can lead me to photograph many things. I let myself be carried away by my feelings, nostalgia, tranquility, saudade, mystery, intrigue. These are things that when I see and feel them, I know I will take the shot.

My inspiration arises immediately when I introduce a new film into my camera, where everything around me becomes a possible verse.

Do you have any favorite cameras and film stocks to use?

One of my favorite films is the Lomography Potsdam Kino 100, although there is still a lot of film to be tested, as well as cameras.

Aside from film, you also showcase your creativity through hip-hop and poetry. Can you tell us more about your work as a hip-hop artist and poet?

Well, first I want to tell you that I have dedicated half of my life to hip-hop and poetry, I always told myself “you have to make a living from this, you were born for this, etc.”, without realizing that I was placing many burdens on myself and demanding too much from myself.

In a brutal way, in 2017, when my artistic career began to ascend, I began to self-sabotage myself and all the steps I climbed. I went down again head first! There were very hard moments of stress and a lot of learning.

Then I began to feel bored, tired, and after so many years I no longer wanted to continue. I got to the point that I just wanted to find any job, have a fixed salary and be ready to have a typical life.

Despite all this, music continues to guide us to beautiful places, even those that I have always longed for. They invited me to attend at the Instituto Cervantes de Tokio in Japan in 2019. I wanted to leave music and poetry behind. But leaving my country was the best thing I did because my inner fire was lit again, I believed again and saw new opportunities.

To finish this answer, for me, hip-hop and poetry are linked. I have always said that it could even be a literary genre, that's why I call it HipHoesía. I want to clarify that not everyone does it, as in photography, there are those who do documentary photography, fashion photography, etc., because the same thing happens with hip-hop music.

I am currently working with the Japanese musician and producer Teru Okada with whom we have released two singles, “Amor habrá” and “Riverside rap”.

When did you start doing hip-hop and poetry? And what do you mostly talk about in your work? What are your inspirations?

I fell in love with hip-hop and poetry in 2003, there I began the whole process of learning to make that music and learning to write poetically, until finally in 2011 I presented my first album titled “La Esencia del Alma” with Jazz artists and MCs from various countries I collaborated with.

It is with this album that I began to perform professionally at poetry and music festivals in general. For four years I was on tour with this album and then I began to release singles every year since for me releasing a song every three months is crazy. I released my most recent album in 2021, featuring two artists from Japan and France.

Mainly in my songs I talk about life, the feelings I have, the world I observe, the moments, each song is like taking you through a photographic or painting exhibition. My work also focuses on writing poetically about the musical basis of hip-hop with jazz, experimental, and Chill Hop. My musical influences were Nujabes, J. Rawls, Fat Jon, Pete Rock.

My music is on all musical platforms, but on my YouTube channel you will find a playlist with several of my songs with subtitles in English, French, Japanese and German. I would love for you to be able to understand what I say in Spanish.

You currently reside in Spain. How does Barcelona affect your art? Do you take inspiration from the art and music scene there?

It affects my way of expressing myself. I found the fragments of freedom that I was missing here, in addition to allowing me to focus on all my projects and ideas that arise, whether they are photography, music or my festival. I also have peace of mind. Even though I live in a city like Barcelona, the bustle is different, it is also very cosmopolitan so I have the possibility of sharing with artists from many parts of the world and learning about their ways of seeing the world.

In general I take more inspiration from art in Europe and not only from Spain, although my gaze is also in Japan and so on. But I try to mix my roots with the sounds, colors and nuances of this territory and thus give my vision of this place that I now inhabit.

You will also be releasing a zine of your photos and poetry. Can you talk more about its content?

The project is under the code name of “Quiet Samir”. It is a visual collection of poems of a story of my life in which I moved with many emotional burdens and social burdens, moved by love and lack of love. I am telling what I saw in silence, sometimes with great sadness, other times with tranquility or anxiety. The images are made on black and white film, in cities in Colombia, France, Romania and Spain.

How do you incorporate film photography into your hip-hop and poetry?

These are three languages that I use in unison. I write images, I write with the images and with them I also compose a soundtrack.

For me everything is a dance, that's how I incorporate it. I see something that I want to photograph for different reasons, and with that something I also start a song. All this already has music that depended on my mood, which in the end is what allows me to create.

Do you think there's a relationship between your poetry, music and film photography?

Yes, it exists and that relationship is connected to my emotional state. I have these three tools to express myself, all three move me in different ways even when it comes to the same feeling that I have created.

And lastly, where can we get copies of your zine?

To get copies of my photozine, please write to me at fotografosamirgallego@gmail.com or on Instagram asking for a copy of the zine. If you are in Barcelona I can deliver it to you personally and for the rest of the world we can organize shipping.

We'd like to thank Samir for sharing his work with us! To view more, visit his LomoHome and Instagram Page.

written by sylvann on 2024-06-23 #culture #people #places #barcelona #hip-hop #poetry #samir-gallego Share Article