About Natalia
I’ve Always Been a Storyteller
I’ve been telling stories for as long as I can remember. Long before I became a photographer, I was a performer. I danced, sang, played music, acted, and spent plenty of time in front of the camera. Dance was one of my earliest ways of telling stories, and when I performed solos in competitions and pageants, I often choreographed them myself. I wasn’t just performing a story someone else had created… I was creating the stories, too.
I’ve always loved photography as well, although I grew up in a time when having a camera in your pocket wasn’t an everyday thing. Photography meant buying a camera, film, processing, and sometimes even having access to a darkroom. So while I loved taking photographs, I found other ways to create and tell stories. Writing, performance, film, and eventually photography all became part of the same creative journey.
Finding My Way Behind the Camera
I studied Communication at the University of Miami, earning a Bachelor of Science with a focus in Motion Pictures, and I also have an Associate’s degree in English with a focus in Creative Writing. In 2016, I became part of the founding class of the University of Miami chapter of Delta Kappa Alpha, the professional cinema fraternity known as the Cinematic Artists of Character.
Photography eventually became something I could pursue professionally. I spent two years as a Picture Day photographer with LifeTouch, explored portrait photography, and have worked in branding, graphic design, and social media. For the past five years I’ve also worked in the performing arts, where my experience has included theatre operations, front-of-house, administration, social media, and event work. During my most recent year at the theatre, archival photography became an important part of my role… and it reminded me of why I absolutely love photography.
Photographs Become History
Working as an archival photographer made me appreciate something I think is true of photography in general: we’re all documenting our time.
A photograph can preserve a performance that happened once, an artist at a particular moment in their career, a community coming together, or a fleeting expression that would otherwise be forgotten. The people looking at that photograph years from now may have no connection to the moment when it was taken, but the image can still tell them something about the people, places, and stories that came before them.
That’s what I want to create. Photographs that don’t just serve a purpose today, but can become part of someone’s history and last for generations.
I love live performance because of its energy, and I’m fascinated by the moments that exist for only a fraction of a second. The movement, expression, connection, and emotion that come together and then disappear. My goal isn’t simply to show that something happened. I want to preserve a little bit of what it felt like to be there.
Taking the Byways
I’m a creative person in just about every part of my life, and I’m not particularly interested in taking the most conventional route. That’s part of where the name Byways comes from: taking the side streets, taking the long way around, and finding the scenic view along the way.
I want to keep exploring, traveling, meeting people, and finding stories worth preserving. Photography gives me a way to do that while supporting the artists, communities, and people whose stories deserve to be remembered.
Because eventually, what we’re experiencing right now becomes history. I want to help make sure we have something tangible to remember it by.