iNTERVIEW WITH FIRST LOOK 2025 ARTIST ANDRIANA NATIVIO, AS WE REST IN THE SHADOWS

We took a moment to dive into the artistic processes behind the artists in First Look 2025 to learn about their process, projects, and what inspires them to create work.

You reference fairy tales, True Crime media, and historical narratives about women. How have these influences shaped your visual and conceptual approach?

So much of what we see in the media is another version of the same story—a young girl or woman is mistreated, her body discarded somewhere in the landscape for someone else to find, as if it were some kind of twisted treasure hunt. How many Netflix specials have turned a real girl’s tragedy into a packaged murder mystery for mass consumption? That’s someone’s life, someone’s loss, yet our culture is obsessed with dead girls and the landscapes they’re found in. I find it heartbreaking, and I choose not to find entertainment in these tragedies. With my work, I aim to push against that stale narrative. I wanted to create a space where external fear doesn’t have to exist, where the girls in my images aren’t constantly looking over their shoulders. Instead, time itself becomes the only thing to be wary of. When I was younger, I didn’t fear the landscape—I played freely within it. But as I grew older and time passed, being overly aware began replacing that freedom, and the fear crept in. My photographs of these two sisters, both the beauty of a black and white landscape contrasted by looming shadows embody that duality.

Your photographs blend your own memories with the sisters’ experiences. How do you navigate the line between documentation and personal storytelling?

I don’t think I see myself as a documentary photographer, at least not right now—I’m more of a storyteller. These images aren’t meant to be a direct record of reality, but rather a space where memories, emotions, and imagination intertwine. The stories I create with the girls unfold naturally, sometimes stemming from my own ideas, sometimes from theirs. It’s a collaborative process, shaped by both their present and my past. I don’t aim to capture absolute truth, but rather the feeling of a moment and the unspoken emotions that linger in between.

How did you connect with the two sisters, and what was it like photographing them?

People always ask how I met the girls, and I choose to keep that between us. Part of my role as a photographic storyteller is to leave room for mystery, I think offering every answer would take away the intrigue. I want viewers to wonder and to maybe even create their own narratives about how our paths crossed.

As for how I connected with them, I treat them as individuals, not just as children. I know what it feels like to want to be taken seriously, both as a girl and now as a woman, so I offer them that same respect. I think they are deeply intuitive, and I believe that’s why we connected so well.I’m still photographing them. I visit them a couple of times a year since I now live in Arizona. This is a long-term project for me, one that I see continuing for a long time, I also see other photographic projects within them that may arise. Photographing them is like seeing both the present and my own past at the same time. I care deeply for both of them, and I hope they continue to allow me to photograph them for years to come.

What do you want people to reconsider about girlhood through your work?

Girlhood is often framed as lighthearted and not given the same depth or weight as boyhood. At the same time, I didn’t feel the need to have the girls intentionally act in a way that countered that by performing how perhaps boys would act or play. What I found is that their time in the landscape wasn’t about trying to take over or conquer it, but about existing within it. There’s moments of rest, closeness, secrets, angst, care, connection, and an unspoken bond between them and the land itself.

This project is important to me because, as a young girl, I was always taught to fear the landscape—not for what it was, but for what could happen to me within it. That fear was ingrained in me, passed down through stories and warnings. In these photographs, I attempt to strip away that fear from both the photographs and the fear I feel within, creating a world where it doesn’t have to exist. If someone looks at these images and assumes they are simply lighthearted because the girls are seen resting in the grass, they are missing the point—how, for so many girls and women, the ability to exist in the landscape and fully connect to it without fear is not just a privilege, but an almost impossible one, something closer to a fairytale than reality.