15 Questions With… Sophie Barbasch

How are you at the moment?

A bit tired but otherwise good!

What is your morning ritual? How does your day begin?

I’m not really a morning person, so the key element is a huge cup of coffee. A perfect morning involves sleeping in, caffeinating, and contemplating the day. Work days are usually more rushed.

What, right now, can you see?

It’s a cloudy fall day and I’m looking out at the Hudson river.

What artist, project, book would you recommend we see/follow?

I love Baldwin Lee’s new book. Everyone should go get a copy! It’s amazing.

Tell us about your process when starting a new project

It varies with the project, but for photographic work, it usually starts with an image. I cast a wide net and see what happens, allowing myself to photograph whatever is interesting. From there, I try to build groups of images to see if they can form a series. I shoot intuitively and try to edit rigorously. I let photographs sit in the drawer for a long time and revisit them periodically. Time helps me see what the photographs are doing more clearly.

What has been your favourite collaboration?

My favourite collaboration is with my cousin Adam. We have been making photographs together for almost 10 years. He’s an incredible person who has taught me a lot about life and photography.

What is your greatest achievement?

When I finish something, it’s a way to move on to the next thing. This is always exciting—to let go of a project and make space for something else. There isn’t one particular moment that stands out in terms of achieving a specific goal. It’s more about the license to start anew.

What is your greatest regret?

I try to mine all of my experiences for lessons. I’m a pretty neurotic person, and yet, I don’t really regret anything. Usually, the moments in my life where I was heading in the wrong direction happened because I wasn’t being fully honest with myself.

What advice would you give to your younger self?

Embrace the fact that you’re a sensitive person.

What is your latest project about?

I currently have a solo show, Obras, up at the Penumbra Foundation in New York City. I also released a book, in conjunction with the exhibition. The work traces the route of a railroad under construction in the northeast of Brazil.

Here is a project statement that gives a bit more context:

A train is like a ligament. The route almost has a corporeal form. It engraves itself into the landscape. In the absence of some sort of structure to understand things, I look to railroads and highways, the veins of commerce and connection. These are also, paradoxically, stand-ins for their opposite: for being lost, uprooted, on the loose.

When I was little, my Brazilian stepmother introduced me to a new language and culture. I learned Portuguese and traveled to Brazil regularly, wondering if I was an insider or an outsider. At some point, I decided I needed to go to Brazil on my own. I applied for a grant to photograph the Transnordestina, a railroad under construction in the Northeast that ties the desert to the sea. I lived in Fortaleza for a year, traveling throughout Ceará, Piauí, and Pernambuco.

I followed the route of the train like a map, listening to stories about drought, the emergence of labor unions, and corrupt judges; about quilombos and their sacred spaces; about assentamentos and different political regimes. People told me about the first railroad built by the British and how the colonial shadow has shifted and morphed but never quite disappeared; they told me about anthropologists who came to extract and were followed home by ghosts. These stories exist in different times, registers, and translations. They give way to images that traverse the dark space between languages.

What are you researching at the moment?

I am researching how to hire voice actors for a new audio piece that involves two people having a conversation. It’s about how subtle power dynamics can shift unexpectedly and constantly between two people.

What can you not work without?

Friends and collaborators.

What challenges have you faced working in your industry?

It’s hard to make art and make money and live in an expensive city like New York. The challenge is to always take stock of where you are in your process, what you need to prioritize, and what you need to make. These factors are always shifting.

What are you hoping for in 2023?

Rest and relaxation.

Share a song with us, what are you listening to at the moment?

Where Will I Be, Emmylou Harris

All images and spreads courtesy the artist. Obras (Penumbra Foundation, 2022) can be purchased here.