PhotoWork with Sasha Wolf
A Photography & Visual Arts Podcast

Alessandra Sanguinetti - Episode 31

4 years ago

In this episode of PhotoWork with Sasha Wolf, Sasha and Magnum photographer Alessandra Sanguinetti discuss her books, On the Sixth Day and The Adventures of Belinda and Guille and the Meaning of their Enigmatic Dreams. Alessandra and Sasha discuss what informs her work, from her rural beginnings and desire to be a storyteller to illness and a moment of questioning her own abilities.

https://alessandrasanguinetti.com

Sanguinetti was born in New York in 1968, and brought up in Argentina where she lived from 1970 until 2003. Her interest in photography began aged 9 when she poured over her mother’s collection of books by Michael Lesy, Dorothea Lange and others. She studied Anthropology at the University of Buenos Aires and General Studies at the International Center of Photography.

In 1996 she began working on a series eventually titled, On the Sixth Day, which explored the complex relationship between man and domesticated animals in the countryside in Argentina. Three years into this project, she turned her attention to two nine-year-old cousins, Belinda and Guille, whose grandmother’s farm had been the subject of Sixth Day. Sanguinetti followed the two girls’ for five years, taking pictures embarked on a life long project, collaboratively photographing the two girls as they grew up and presently as adult women. The first five years culminated in a much-acclaimed monograph, The Adventures of Belinda and Guille and the Meaning of their Enigmatic Dreams (2010).

Sanguinetti is a recipient of a Guggenheim Foundation fellowship and a Hasselblad Foundation grant. Her photographs are included in public and private collections, such as the Museum of Modern Art (NY), the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. She has photographed for the The New York Times Magazine, LIFE, Newsweek, and New York Magazine and is currently based in San Francisco

Sanguinetti has been a member Magnum since 2007. She is currently based in California.

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From the PhotoWork Foundation, the PhotoWork Podcast, hosted by Sasha Wolf, is a leading photography podcast featuring in-depth interviews with photographers, curators, publishers, and other influential figures in the fine art photography world. Each episode explores contemporary and post-documentary photography, photobooks, and the artistic process, offering insight, inspiration, and education for photographers, photography students, and creative professionals. The PhotoWork Foundation supports the development and education of post-documentary photographers and cultivates an engaged audience for their work. Through its programs, the Foundation highlights photography that is often not commercially viable but essential for understanding contemporary society and visual storytelling. For more episodes, show notes, and resources for photographers, visit www.photowork.foundation and follow us on Instagram @photowork.foundation.