My earliest memories of photography were when my brother and I used to climb up the huge rolls of newsprint ready to be used at the newspaper where my father worked, the same newsprint that would later emerge from the press with photos printed on it.
I learned photography by being stubborn. I resigned from the place I was working and bought a camera and a few rolls of film, and started to learn what the equipment was for and what it could do. Soon I got an internship at a local newspaper in Brasilia and that’s when I went into journalism.
The assignment about the indigenous Xingu peoples had an effect on me, firstly, because it was a culture different from mine, and secondly, because it revealed values to me that I never could have imagined in comparison to my own life and my relationships with other people and with nature.
I enjoy photographing people's daily lives and I search for quirky stories that are different from our own world. Also, despite not having covered a dangerous conflict, I confess that is a subject I’m curious about.
When shooting pictures, I think of people who don’t have much spare time in their lives, and I try to synthesise my images in order to convey an objective and coherent message.
My biggest lesson has been understanding that we can always improve our photos. The pursuit of excellence is part of a photojournalist’s profession.
Photography is the biggest thing in my life, and every day I learn something new, I’m more convinced that I know less about photography than I’d like to.
