Iciar Vega de Seoane
- Anna Lilli Garai
- May 27
- 4 min read
Iciar Vega de Seoane works with images and words to build quiet, fictional worlds. In photobooks like “The Blue Volcano” and “Lucero,” she puts together scenes that feel calm and focused, with strong emotion just under the surface. Her style is direct and personal, often guided by feeling rather than story. Some works include her body, others don’t, but all of them feel close and observant. She’s interested in what gives a place meaning, and how images can hold that feeling in a simple, careful way.
Q: What usually starts a new project for you—a(n) image, a phrase, a feeling?
A: What makes me start a project is a restlessness, or a subject that interests me because it somehow has something to do with me. Often I start a project and I don’t know where it’s going to take me—it begins with just the subject, and it transforms into other things when I write the texts and take the photos. Then I make decisions along the way, and I sort and decipher where the project is really going and what it’s about.
It’s a very lively process where I let my creativity flow until, after a while, I sort it out and figure out its provisional synopsis, let’s say. Then I begin to direct it and create images according to what I want to express within the editing process. But it can take a long time to get to that point. My texts often take many different paths—I can have texts that are very different from each other, that open up avenues in story, tone, narrative, and style. So decision-making is one of the most important parts of the process for me. I think it requires determination, but also a lot of flexibility and openness, which is where I enjoy the creativity.
Q: You call photography a parallel reality. Why does that space feel more honest?
A: I don’t know if it is a more honest space, but it’s the space I choose when I create and where I feel most comfortable. Photography is an art discipline that depends heavily on reality—it’s a record of what you have in front of you. Not that I reject documentary photography, but what interests me is what’s underneath what you see: what you feel and what the images suggest. I like to construct narratives and fictionalize based on what reality offers me. That’s where I can give free rein to my imagination and creativity.
Q: Does writing guide your visual work, or is it the other way around?
A: Writing walks alongside and adds to my visual work in the form of photobooks.
There has been a project—"Unborn Warrior" (2017)—in which I constructed the narrative before taking the photos and from the text, but I don’t usually work that way. I take photos and, at the same time, I force myself to maintain the habit of writing. Once the project has progressed, during the layout process, I fit the text between the photos.
Q: "The Blue Volcano" touches on longing and beauty. What brought you there?
A: The initial idea of the project was born from a personal search for peace and happiness. For this, I tried to identify what things make me feel frustrated with myself, what my goals are, what I try to achieve in my day-to-day life. And which of those goals were motivated by the desire to always possess more than what one has—more than what one needs to live—and which were motivated by the norms of social status, or by what is normatively understood as success and wealth.
This helped me focus my existence on things that make me happy and peaceful, things that have nothing to do with money, possessions, or status.
And it materialized in a photobook and a poem that speaks of an imaginary paradise.
Q: Can fiction reveal more about the self than autobiography?
A: I think that existing in the world already blurs the boundary between fiction and autobiography. They say: put on a mask, and you will be yourself.
I think creativity is a game. In my work, I leave this answer open—let the reader or the viewer decide.
I question to what extent autobiographical works reflect reality—how transparent or sincere they are. From the moment you prepare a scene, frame it, choose a setting or a time of day to take photos, or decide what you are going to show about your life and what you are not. Does autobiography reflect who you really are, who you think you are, or who you want others to see you as?
Q: What kind of freedom are you chasing when you make work?
A: Total creative freedom. Control and respect for my own fluctuations and rhythms—where I position myself. The feeling of having taken a weight off my shoulders every time I publish a book. Of having spent my time on something I have chosen one hundred percent. The freedom of not depending on anyone to carry out my artistic work—from the photos to the layout of my photobooks.
