Felipe Gottardello
Vans Authentic
@fcgottardello is a visual artist – photographer, videomaker and designer. Asidefrom all this, he is a traveler, always looking for new places, new people and new inspirations. Felipe told us about the force that makes him move and also how the sneakers he puts on are a part of what he wants to communicate to the world.
“My name is Felipe Caplan Gottardelo, I’m 25 years old and I’m a Visual Artist – I’ve been taking photos, working with visual arts and design for 4 years now. I’m completely in love with traveling, but not traveling as a tourist but seeing new places and meeting new people through real connections”.
“Socialization is in some way artificial, you can socialize with a bunch of people in one night and not take any of those people with you in your life, while connections are knowing that it’s worth having that person in your life, besides it being something reciprocal.”
You’ve already lived in many parts of the world, working or volunteering. What gives you this drive to leave your home to go live in so many other places?
FelipeIt’s all because on the first time I went to live in another country I realized there was so much stuff to see out there. I can’t get a good night sleep, I can’t stay too long in the same place knowing that some many other places out there await me. I’m too frantic to stay in the same place, I need to move, and it’s what fuels my creative drive and my drive to create things. The Felipe that doesn’t travel doesn’t produce anything, because in the end traveling is my source of material, it’s seeing new things, it’s going to Morroco and learning how they make tiles, the countries intrinsic design that I had never even heard of before going there. So it’s almost like you have to “see it to believe it”
I’ve been a very introspective person my whole life, and it was by traveling that I learned to connect myself. And by this, I learned that connection, which is different than socialization, is what gives you real friendships. Socialization is in some way artificial, you can socialize with a bunch of people in one night and not take any of those people with you in your life, while connections are knowing that it’s worth having that person in your life, besides it being something reciprocal.
But in the end the need to travel is a feeling, it’s not logical, it’s just an urge that exists. It’s the same thing that makes me ambitious about my work, it’s that thing that takes hold of me and I can’t find a logical way to describe what it is… it’s just this need that says “dude, you need to go out there” and just I have to answer it when it shows up.
besides traveling, what else inspires your work? From photography, video to Design.
felipeAs a matter effect, I’m going through a very interesting transition right now, because photography is my main “thing”, and before I only had eyes for landscapes and that was my inspiration and I would make everything else starting from that. Today I’m realizing and understanding how to produce without limiting my vision to one subject only. Obviously, you’re going to gravitate naturally towards something, but you have to practice your vision all the time, you have to take pictures every day; if you want o to be a good designer you have to make stuff every day; if you want to film, you also have to do it all the time. It’s consistency, this made realize that inspiration comes from you training your eye, from making stuff with your vision.
To give a little bit of context, explain to us what is this place that we've come to take these pictures today?
felipeThis place is called Cabo de Gata, it’s this really cool natural park in the south of Spain. I decided to stop here during a road trip across the cost of Spain, which is a place that was a part of another trip that was very important to me. I discovered this place around the same time I realized that productivity is the key for you to be a better producer of any kind of art. That for you to evolve you have to produce stuff, this was the place I had this epiphany.
Now talking about sneakers, putting brands and models aside – what do they represent to you?
felipeIt’s 100% about identification, being so, that the brand that I like the most is the brand that sells a lifestyle that I identify myself with. If I know they’re stories, I can say “Damn! How do you know who I am? How are you telling me this story?”.
When I put on a sneaker like this one, I’m saying to everyone that this is my lifestyle. I have this crazy thing where real beauty is when you’re comfortable inside your own body and I think that you have to always be doing that in a way that’s best for you. For example, if you want to go to the gym because this will make you feel better than go to the gym; if you want to wear something that’s going to make you feel and identify yourself better than just wear it; it’s the same thing when you’re buying sneakers. It’s very important to be comfortable with your identity.
When did your relationship with sneakers begin?
felipeIt was definitely when I started to skate, without a doubt. It’s so crazy how in the skate community, the group you belong to is defined by the type of sneakers you wear. There was Fallen that now Rests in Peace, that when broke a just a while back. That was my inspiration, I would go crazy over those guys, they were exactly what I was at the time – a crazy rocker that wanted to be with his friends on the street all the time. This was the image that they sold, I even remember some ads that they had on CemporcentoSKATE, where they had the pictures of the shoes looking brand new and then had another picture of the shoes completely trashed, I went crazy for that stuff – to me they were skate shoes made for real skaters. It was at the time when I realized that you start your identity from your feet up.
“I was already into this sneaker for a while, it was a new chapter in my life and I decided to buy them.”
Why did you choose this Vans for the photoshoot?
felipeThis Vans came into my life at a very good moment, as several things had happened and I found myself making my first trip alone. It was a long trip, 40 days on a bus, it was the first time I came to Europe. It was a moment that I was discovering the world, the whole trip was about discoveries. Back then I had this thing that I would buy I sneaker every time I would go on a cool trip, and when I was in Brussels I felt it time. I was already into this sneaker for a while, it was a new chapter in my life and I decided to buy them. These in specific, where mainly because of how they looked, simple, and not to mention a really good moment in my life.
@vans Authentic
Bought in: 2016
Owner: @fcgottardello
Photos by: Kickstory
