Rossella Vanon was born in a small city near the sunny italian capital Rome. After a youth full of creative impulses, she decided to follow her inspiration by travelling first to the north city of Milan and then to the beautiful London, where she currently lives and works, and that she calls ‘home’.

“The moving night sceneries, the amazing parks, the respect for animals and people and the opportunities this City is able to give to whom are strong enough to go and get them, made me vibrate of a new sensitivity towards life and the small details that make it special. I felt the urge of constantly taking my camera with me to capture all the little things that made me smile, focusing on the stunning variety of colours, textures and shades that only nature can provide.” It was love at first shot.

Since then, Rossella Vanon has been focusing her career on fashion and beauty photography, publishing her work in national and international magazines.

 When did you begin creating as a hobby? Describe the first time you created something that excited you about art: The way I started with photography is a little unusual. I have been involved in music since I can remember. Singing, playing instruments, writing songs. I have always loved art, and I grew into appreciating photography slowly, until I started spending every night studying a photography book and taking notes after spending the day writing essays for my Recording Arts Degree. Little by little, my free time became devoted to my camera and to long photography sessions in the park with my Canon 100mm macro lens.

When did you begin creating as a profession? It was only after months of nature and landscape photography that I decided to explore fashion and beauty photography, and I instantly fell in love with it. The amount of creativity the photographer can put into every single shot, by deciding colours, shapes, textures, feelings is so very inspiring. I’m still absolutely in love with it. By then I had already bought some new equipment and I was feeling very confident with my knowledge of photography. That is when I started thinking about it as a profession. I’ve been involved in fashion photography for a year now, and I love it.

The work I’m most proud of is, and the story behind the work: It is hard to tell which work I am most proud of, as it is sometimes hard for a photographer to judge a picture for what it is without thinking about the amount of time and effort spent in starting and developing the whole project, in preparation and execution. I am usually very proud when I see good images coming out of a problematic shoot. Visually, though, some spontaneous snaps can look absolutely gorgeous. I like ‘The Rebirth’ for instance. It portraits a woman in water, wrapped in pink veil, with little pink flowers floating all around her. That was such an improvised shoot, and the picture was taken in my bathtub. The whole shoot took about 20 minutes, but we were all pleased with the results afterwards.

Do you have a certain style or are you inspired by the moment: I certainly have my own style, but being able to get inspired by the moment is always a great thing. Sometimes, no matter how much you plan, things don’t work out the way you wanted. So you have to start re planning, on the spot, last minute, playing and creating with what is at your disposal. In that case being able to get inspired by the moment can save a whole shoot – and it’s such an adrenaline rush!

How would you describe your style? I think what defines my work is more about the emotions conveyed by the images, the feelings they arise, rather than a strict lighting or photographic style. I also like to play with colours and soft tones, and that probably emerges from all of my works.

How does spontaneity inspire you? Spontaneity is the ability to look around you and make the best of what you have. It’s acting quickly and, sometimes, not following any rules. Spontaneity is always exciting and inspiring. See last minute-shoots, for instance. Sometimes they turn out as good as those that you have been planning for months. It’s all about opening your eyes and letting the creativity guide you.

In general, during a creative session, how long would you say you take to create one piece? I usually work for fashion editorials, which consist in a series of outfit to shoot in the same day, usually with the same models and within the same or a similar location. There has to be a concept, a title, and all of the final shots that are sent to the magazine (generally from 7 to 15 images) need to be pertinent to the storyline. That usually take a whole day to shoot, including changes in make-up, hair and outfit.

Describe your typical work-flow: there is no strict work-flow, really. Sometimes I come up with a concept and I develop a styling idea around that. Sometimes is the other way around: I see something beautiful, maybe in a movie, or in the street, and after building up that detail with styling, make-up, choice of location and so on, I look at the result and I name it after the feeling I get from looking at all of the final images together.

How technical is your work? It depends on which stage we are talking about. Coming up with a concept and brainstorming around it to figure out what form shoot is going to take, is not technical at all. The shooting part itself can be a little technical, but also pretty free depending on the style of photography you want to achieve. The post processing, the editing on the digital images is probably the most technical part.

What technologies do you use with your art? I use digital and film photography and computer software’s for digital manipulation.

How do you decide on materials, locations & subjects? It’s all about the starting point. Once I get a brief, or I come up with an idea, I can think about locations, styling and models that would best express the concept.

 What makes you choose one medium over another? If we are talking about digital or film photography, they give two totally different feelings to the pictures, so one is usually chosen over the other depending on the concept and on how fresh or vintage we want the whole product to look.

 Do you have the same set of models or do you use different models every time? There are a few models that I have worked with more than once. It’s good to change and have new faces on your portfolio, but on the other hand finding good models is really hard, so once you find one.. don’t let her go!

 When you’re not creatively inspired, what do you do to get the creative juices flowing? I try to relax, have a walk, watch a movie, listen to music, read a book. In general, I try to keep my eyes and ears open for inspiration.

 People are telling you that your work is good, but you’re not satisfied with it. How do you know is it good, are they just being nice? If you get a really good feedback from quite a lot of people on a piece that you’re not satisfied with, it is probably genuine appreciation, but it still wouldn’t make me like the piece if I wasn’t happy with it in the first place. On the other hand, I’m happier to produce work that I really like but people don’t seem to appreciate as much.

 How do you choose which work to display or publish? I always display the work that I’m most satisfied with.

 Do you have it critiqued by someone else, or do you just go with what our heart tells you is right? I usually follow my own instinct and go with what my heart tells me is right. I only have images critiqued by people that know art and whose work I really admire.

 Has your work been published or displayed anywhere before? My work has been published on British, Spanish, American and Italian digital and printed magazines, including Vogue Italia’s website:  HYPERLINK “http://www.vogue.it/photovogue/Profilo/8d3d2fd1-4626-41c3-907b-87be7a22cb27/User” http://www.vogue.it/photovogue/Profilo/8d3d2fd1-4626-41c3-907b-87be7a22cb27/User

 Do you see your art changing in the next 6 months? What do you see yourself doing in 5 years? I want to start shooting more on film, and I definitely see myself working on a separate film project in the next 6 months. I also want to explore the world of motion and experiment with fashion movies.

 List your top 3-5 photographers: My top 3 photographers are Tim Walker, Paolo Roversi and Annie Leibovitz. There is such grace in their images.

 What motivates you to do what you do? It’s the creativity, in all of its different stages and forms. From all the planning and brainstorming around the concept, to the day of the shoot where all the ideas, the notes and the sketches finally take form, to the selection and editing stage and all the attention to detail and the consequent squinting it involves. A photo shoot it’s an amazing example of pure teamwork and it’s hard to understand the amount of work every single project is, before, during and after the shoot. And this is exactly what makes it so addictive: the creativity, the adrenaline and the smiles of the people around you, when after a long day you pack up your equipment knowing that you have all done a good job.

 Where do you take inspiration from? Little things. Sometimes a scene in a movie can give me inspiration for a whole fashion story. Or a book, or a beautiful location. When you keep your eyes open, everything turns into a muse. To me, it’s all about finding your own personal way of telling the story. And the lighting, the colours, the shapes, the camera and a good team are all the words you need. It’s quite true when they say ‘a picture is worth 1,000 words’!

 What does beauty mean to you? Beauty is whatever makes me feel. Whatever gives me good chills. Beauty can be a shocking, extravagant image as much as the simplest thing depicted with passion and emotion. And most importantly, beauty is what motivates me to keep on creating beauty.

 Why do you think photography is important to you? Photography has taught me to concentrate on how naturally beautiful things are and on which point of view, background or distance would make them even better: photography taught me the most positive way to approach the world.

Since then this passion is growing stronger everyday, keeping on changing the way I see life. And not only through the viewfinder.

 Date of birth? 25/03/1985

Place of birth? Rome, Italy

www.rvanonphotography.com

https://www.facebook.com/pages/rossellavanonphotography