Some memories aren’t just kept in a photograph — they mark a before and an after.
This is one of them. This is, quite literally, where it all began.

I was 17 years old, had just finished high school, and didn’t really know what I was going to do with my life, but one thing was crystal clear: I wanted to be a dancer, a model, and an actress. My mother knew it better than anyone. She worked retouching negatives — yes, back when everything was analog — and as a graduation gift, she asked one of her photographer friends to do a photo shoot of me. Just like that. No strategy. No professional expectations. Simply a gift full of love and intuition.

I remember that day perfectly. It was my first fashion shoot. The first time I stood in front of a “real” camera. The first time someone looked at me as more than just a teenage girl fresh out of high school. I felt huge… even though I was only 5’2”.

At the time, I didn’t yet know that my height wouldn’t exactly work in my favor in the modeling world. It didn’t matter. There was no pressure, no frustration, no comparison. Just excitement, desire, and a very clear feeling of being exactly where I wanted to be.

That blue dress — so simple, yet now so full of meaning — represents the beginning of many things: my relationship with the camera, my love for storytelling through the body and the eyes, and a creative path that, despite many pauses and detours, never completely faded away.

Over time, I understood that not all dreams come true the way we imagine them at 17. But I also learned something far more important: dreams transform, evolve, and sometimes patiently wait for us to be ready to return to them.

This was the beginning. And like all meaningful beginnings, at the time it didn’t seem like much. Just a young girl, a blue dress, and a camera. But in hindsight, this is where a very essential part of me was born.