Cristian Bravo Portfolio

Portrait by Felix Adler

What is your background in skateboarding?

I've been skating for 20 years. Many people started because of Tony Hawk, back on the PlayStation, I'm one of those kids. I was just practicing skating in my backyard alone in the grass. I'm turning 33 tomorrow, so it's been a good 18 years of skating. I’ve worked in skateboarding, too. I was working as an agent for Beast Distribution, I worked in skate shops, and I’ve shot for skateboarding brands. For me, skating was just a vehicle to get to photography or to art or to access experiences, going on a trip with your friends, and skateboarding has been the explosion that led to all these other things.

So the photography was sparked from skating?

It came out of the experience of skating. The experience of being out there with your friends and suddenly realising I was taking so many pictures. At some point, this photography thing on my phone was becoming like skateboarding for me. Back then I didn’t have a camera. For me, cameras were confusing. ISO, exposure, what are all those things? I just wanted to click and have a photo. I remember the exact day that I was on the train with my board and I was taking photos of people on the train thinking, “Damn, this is like skating.” You find a spot and you make it your own. I never had this much interest outside of skating in anything. I like art and I like painting, that’s what I studied, but with photography i was like, “Fuck, this is fun!”

Did you start out shooting skating as well?

I never shot skateboarding. I have no clue. It's the truth. I have photos where skateboarding is involved, but it's never been about the tricks for me, because I like to do the tricks myself. It's more been about the culture or about what happens in skateboarding, using skateboarding as the excuse to take photographs. That's how I got into photography. I've never been a fan of pretending to be something I'm not or tell someone to stay there and pose. I was just taking photos of things I saw in the street. Now, it's completely diverted into different paths. Skateboarding for me still is the same as photography, just a different tool. It's a way to express yourself, to interact with your environment and with the people. It's a way to discover the world in a way that no other tool can offer.

You shoot Contax cameras, which have become pretty fashionable over the years. Why are they your tool of choice?

I got my first Contax when it was cheap, 10 years ago. It still wasn't really cheap, just not insanely expensive. I was recommended the camera because of the lenses, Carl Zeiss. I thought, well, I want my pictures to look good, so that must mean something. I was gifted my first T2 from my parents. They gave it to me for Christmas when I was maybe 22. It cost them 200 bucks back then. If you know photography and you know exactly what you’re trying to get, these cameras are not for you. Many people are like, “Wow, it's such a good camera,” and then they buy it and they're like, “Fuck this shit.” Literally! It's expensive. They break. You can't even frame.

You shoot it as if you know exactly what you’ll get though, your compositions are so on point! Why do you choose to work analog?

It's like a guessing game for me, it really works because it's a constant conversation with failure. Film is basically failure... And success sometimes, but when it’s a success, it really is a success. In my opinion, digital photography is too perfect. You always have so many options, and you don't like any of them. In the end you might even end up mixing two images together in Photoshop. For me, analog works because I'm a really perfectionist person, which is horrible. These cameras allow me to be free from all that perfection and it really helps me to keep going forward and not get stuck trying and trying something and thinking it’s not good enough. I go on trips, I shoot 40 rolls, I go back home, and when I'm home, I think to myself, “Fuck, they all suck.” It's normal because you're too attached to the moment and you need to let it rest a little bit. After a while, as an “outsider” now, I can accept my work and be like, “Wow, these are pretty crazy photos.” Maybe not unlike when you see something you've never seen before, kind of like a new fashion trend, like, “Oh, that's weird, no?” But eventually you’re like, “Shit, this is good. Maybe I was just not ready to accept my work in that way.” It really helps me to fail constantly, because in the end, organically, it leads to a new result. Then you want to pursue that result, and you're never going to get it. It takes you somewhere else. I really, really like using my cameras for that reason, because I know that things are never going to be how I see them in the camera. I try to be in control. It's a fight. Always. They'll break eventually and I'll start using whatever I'll use. But for now, I have several bodies and I really like using them. Also, it's inspiring when you see that camera, like, “How beautiful are you?” and then you find out it was designed by Porsche.

Knowing all of this, you must have some confidence shooting jobs on those cameras?

I'm not a religious person. When I shoot jobs on my cameras, you have to believe. You have to be a believer. I try to use my cameras because when I do commercial jobs, which is I would say, 60% of my income, I'm usually hired because brands like my work. Some fools thinks my work is good, so I'm like, “Are you sure?” [laughs] I get hired because they want my results. That really allows me to be myself on set as well and use my tools. It's funny, sometimes it's not the case. Often I tell people, “I don't know. I mean, I want the project, I need the money, but are you sure you want me to do it?” Sometimes I've been like that because the people are asking for really specific results and they're like, “Oh, my God, we love your work”, and stuff. I'm flattered. Really, it's so cool. But then what they're showing me is something completely different to what I'm doing. I got to be honest with them, I'm not going to say yes, yes, yes, and then deliver something different because then you're going to talk shit about me. I might not be the right person to do the job many times. Usually I'm lucky and I get to use my cameras and my tools. Otherwise, it's not me. It's not that I'm the camera. It's like anybody can buy the camera, or anybody who has the money for it, but yeah, I'm just so used to using those tools. It's like skating. You skate maybe 8.5, and then they hire you to do this trick in this spot with a fucking penny board. I don't know, brother, a 7.5, with 15 millimetre wheels. It is a skateboard, but it's not your tool. It's the same with the camera. So many people have pencils. Only Michelangelo was drawing the way he did. It's a tool. But it made me learn about the things I'm interested in, and I'm always trying to push the limits of the camera. I use lenses that no one else would use in this type of environment. I try to always give it a twist, and it makes you learn. It's just an experiment altogether. For me, getting jobs is the result of always carrying the camera to Lidl. In the end, my goal is to keep being able to buy film, so I can keep going to Lidl to take photos of grandmas going for a walk. My goal with photography has never been to try and get jobs. If I wanted to do jobs, I’d have a Canon 6D, and I'd be a different person. Jobs helped me keep being able to be a photographer, not buy a Porsche. No. It's just so I can keep shooting things I like and keep the experiment going.

I always get a bit of nostalgia looking at your photos, is there something you are looking to express?

I'm not really sure, because I don't make images. The photos that I take are already there. I just say yes to my finger. So I'm not really trying to find stuff that looks a certain way. I guess it's part of my way of looking at things. Everything is a collection of everything you've watched, all the artists you've seen, the way you dress, the movies you watch. Everything in the end leads to a result. What are you interested in when you look around? So many times I'm working in the street and I see nothing.
I don't do it anymore, but I used to go out only to take pictures, just going on a walk until I finish the roll. I didn’t care if it was nighttime, I’d finish the roll or not come home. It was a time, six years ago, I was forcing myself to see things, even if there was nothing. Sometimes I was taking a photo of the nothing. It led to being able to find stuff where sometimes there's nothing. I'm not looking for anything specific. I'm not interested in things I've already seen or pictures I've already taken, because what's the point? When you go out in the street, you're going to take the photo of the guy with the dog, the Dalmatian, that looked like it's supposed to be a photograph, or someone carrying a suitcase. There's all this cliché, going to New York and taking photos of the smoke or the yellow taxi. I'm not shooting these things. I've done it before. I'm not going to repeat that. I always ask myself, where else can you look and what else can be interesting? I'm never exactly sure what I want to photograph. At the same time, I don't know how it’s going to look when it's being photographed. Because one can believe something looked like this, and then you see the photo and it looks like shit. I guess it's more like how I curate my work, in my case. I know that so many of my pictures by themselves alone are not strong, but sometimes, depending on how you build a story, then the photos become stronger together, more like a series. By themselves, I don't think my photos are interesting. Sometimes I'm lucky and one photo can be really strong, but usually the photos are not that cool. The way I present my work sometimes really, really helps people perceive it like they do, but I'm not going for a specific look.

Without the self-assigned photo walks, when and where do you shoot your work?

I have a life. It sounds like a joke, but I used to tell myself that I have to take pictures. Now, I feel it's more like an acceptance exercise, like, I have to go to the doctor, might as well be interesting. Maybe I'll see something there. I rarely say no to a plan, especially if it's something I've never done. If somebody asks me if I want to go on a mountain tour, yes, I'm going. Or my uncle, for example, he works in construction. In between jobs, two years ago, he asked me, do you want to come work for me? I was like, “Dude, yes.” It was so cool because we would go to the factory where you buy the metal and stuff. I was like, “Damn, what a fucking sick location.” I never say no to a plan, everything is welcome, and anything can be interesting. Just accept life as it comes and see what it brings and the camera is going to be there. The more you're open to the world, the more things come.

Where does this curation happen? I’m guessing it’s mostly on Instagram where people would discover you? What role does Instagram play for you?

I mean, yeah, in 2026, unfortunately, it is how people discover you. But it's funny because you met me in person and you know my work, and you know I'm not my Instagram. Some people are like, “Oh, that's you?” I'm like, “No, that's my photos.” But of course, Instagram is a really powerful tool for my work. It's been a really good way to connect fashion with skating and show it to the right people. It’s given me job opportunities. Instagram has been the tool for me to use as the window to the world and it did help me create a community that is into art.

But there's so much content, man, so much content. It's constant. When you scroll, you don't see quality stuff, it's like going to McDonald's. You just see crap, crap, crap, boobs, ass, Epstein, Epstein, Trump. Hopefully, some interior design, some shoes… skating, of course. But it's difficult to find quality content online.

How do you present your work offline?

I have two exhibitions right now that are going to happen. One is a big exhibition in London in July. There are big names like Shepard Ferry and Steve Olson involved. It's 20 artists and it's about skate culture, but not necessarily about skateboarding. It's going to be a way of displaying people's work who belong in skateboarding and have been led to different results, but in the end, are connected by the same thing. Also, in a couple of weeks, I have a little zine release. I'm doing it in collaboration with this camera store in Barcelona that I've known for years and we’ve never done anything together. Every time I'm here I like to do something for my city and make something happen in Barcelona, a social thing. It's a cool exercise to get to know the people who follow your work or for new people to discover your work. I do exhibitions with my gallery “Window14”, which is in Geneva. They take me to fairs. I've exhibited at “Unseen Amsterdam.” We've done an exhibition in Switzerland. I had a show in San Francisco. I do like to do exhibition stuff. I'm hoping I can move more into that field of photography where you can just be you. I also like doing jobs, it’s like homework a little bit. It’s like a challenge, I hate it, but let's see if I can discover something new or maybe learn something. We all hate working, but I like doing things that are interesting. So if a job can be interesting, I'm interested!