Bio

Artist’s statement

I had for a while a long statement that attempted to explain who I am and why do I do what I do. It made sense to write it. I had just turned my life upside down: I abandoned my job and professional career to become a photographer as I moved back to my home town after 4 years abroad. I needed to understand and make sense of my life to whistand the vertigo and the trepidation I was experiencing.

Now the vertigo is gone. Its always the same with changes and crisis.
It is not the first time I have left almost everything or totally changed career paths. When asked I often come up with reasonable and satisfying explanations about the reasons why, but I believe its more faithful to reality to accept that there is only a part to be explained and that the rest is a mixture between opportunity, luck and motivation.

On opportunity, luck and motivation: I had an alright childhood but my lack of tools to digest some events and emotions led to a difficult adolescence. Then after I retrieved myself I devoted many years to learn and indeed to help others in healing and understanding. I started medicine and left in the third year, then graduated in social work, then graduated in psychology, studied a 3years masters in Intregrative Counselling and a diploma in Sexual therapy, plus a one year diploma in Humanistic Counselling. For around 4 years I worked mostly within acute mental health units, forensic rehabilitation settings and with individuals with severe psychosocial needs. Throughout the years I began to feel some heaviness, that of all the stored horrors my clients had gone through and would keep going through. That of my own. Client’s memories became somehow my own and there were days were it was difficult to let go. Creating, in whatever form, helped me maintain the balance. When I finished my MSc thesis and as we decided to come back to Spain, I saw my life could take a different path. I did not truly decide to stop being a therapist, I decided to allow myself become a photographer.

And it took everything over.

For some years I could create endlessly. A world of fiction where my mind could be free, to speak, to think, to feel…It was like a dream…

Somewhere along this path I became a mother and my two boys took everything over. Currently I am in the process of finding how to integrate the artist I want to be with the mother that I am.

If you have any queries, questions, projects you want to share with me, please do email me. I am also open to participate in any kind of project, work, proposal that is interesting. You can contact me at info@sandratorralba.com either in English, Spanish, French or Italian.

Artistic studies

Intensive course Illumination Techniques: Cinematographic techniques applied to photography – Sep-Dec 2009
MA (Master) in Photography at EFTI (School of Photography and Image technology) –  Valedictory of 2008

Workshops and lectures with: Jill Greenberg, Matt Siber, Nancy Davenport, Mauricio Alejo, Eugenio Ampudio, Chris Steele Perkins, Manuel de los Galanes, Jesús Micó, Luis Malibrán, José Ramón Bas, Miguel Oriola, José Luis Santalla, Alfonso Zubiaga, Francis Tsang, Cuico Gutierrez, Valentín Sama, Daniel Canogar.
Solo Exhibitions
2013

“My world”- Galerie 4- Czec Republic

2010

Estranged Sex at My Name is Lolita’s Art (Madrid, Spain)
Estranged Sex at Museum of Sex (NY, US)
Estranged Sex at El Fotomata (Sevilla, Spain)

Collective Exhibitions
2015

“30 years of Galerie4” – Group exhibition of the 100 best international photographers ever to have exhibited in the gallery. Czec Republic.
“KontAKTfoto 2015”- Czec Republic
“Nuevas Propuestas”- Gallery Art Room – Madrid
VII Edición Video en el Cuarto – Gallery Art Room – Madrid
Begoña Malone Art Gallery
2013

“Don’t Look at my camera”- Museo Municipal Ourense y Festival Outono Fotográfico da Imagem de Braga (Ourense)
“Uneasy Pleasure”- Summa Art Fair, MataderoMadrid (Madrid)
“Un mundo sin memoria”- Alliance Francaise (Madrid)
“En Pelotas”- Galería Cero (Madrid)
Franqueados 0.13- (Madrid)
6ºProyector Internacional Videoart (Milan)
Sexupone IV (Cadiz)
2012

Fictional Eyes: the dreams of reason- at The lunch Box Gallery (Miami)
The Wild Bunch- Asm28 (Madrid)
Proyector videoarte (Madrid)
Sexupone III- (La Linea)
ALART- Art de nit at Alaró- at Addaya Centre d´Art Contemporani (Mallorca)
Nuevos valores de la Fotografía Actual- at Espacio Off EFTI (Madrid)
Arte40- Aula Lab40 at the C Arte C del Museo del Traje- (Madrid)
2011

Sexupone II- (Gibraltar, Portimao, Barcelona)
JustMad 2011- Galeria Cero- (Madrid)
Fotomatas- Galeria El Fotomata- (Sevilla)
Nuevos Valores de la fotografía- Imagina Aranjuez 2011- (Aranjuez)
2010

Estranged Sex – The Museum of Sex NY (NY,US)
SevillaFoto (Sevilla)
MADRIDFOTO – with My Name’s Lolita Art – Palacio de los Deportes (Madrid)
Sexo en el Fotomata (Sevilla)
INCOMODOS- Cero Art Gallery (Madrid)
2009

MADRIDFOTO – with My Name’s Lolita Art- (IFEMA, Madrid)
Festival de Arte ARTENDENCIAS – “Espacio El Cubo” (Pozuelo, Madrid)
100×100 Galería Espai [b] – (Barcelona)
“Novísimas” – My Name is Lolita’s Art Gallery (Madrid)
Centro Cultural Pablo Ruiz Picasso (Colmenar Viejo, Madrid)
2008

Seleccionados de EFTI – Centro Municipal de las Artes (Alcorcón, Madrid)
De tal palo tal astilla – Sala Tarazona Foto (Tarazona, Zaragoza)
PHE 08- EFTI for PhotoEspaña 2008
1 Premio de Fotografia Ciudad de las Palmas de Gran Canaria

Work in collections

Museum of Sex NY
EFTI
Private Collectors

Awards

June 2010 – Descubrimientos de PHE2010 (Madrid)- PhotoEspaña 2010
2008 – Valedictory of the Masters in Photography at EFTI

Other relevant information

2005-2007 – Msc in Therapeutic Counselling at Greenwich University, london, UK
2006-2007 – PgDip in Psychology at UEL East London University, London, UK
2005 – Diploma in Humanistic Counselling at Hackney university College, London, UK
2001-2004 – Graduate in Social Work at UNED (Open University), Madrid, Spain
2003-2004 – Diploma in Sexual Therapy and Couples Counselling at Sexpol, Madrid, Spain
100h Diploma in Gender Studies
100h Diploma in Psychosocial Intervention in Catastrophes and Emergencies