Farah Sosa identifies as a photographer with an emphasis on multicultural musical landscapes. She was born in Guatemala City and has been living in Los Angeles since 2006. She currently lives in Highland Park, California.
Sergio: Please describe your childhood home
Farah Sosa: We moved a lot when I was a kid so there wasn’t a specific place that I would call my childhood home. I feel that all my homes were temporary. My dad was always building homes as he was searching for a better future for the family but they all had a few things in common: They all had my mother around shaping it to be her way in the home with my older sister and me. It was clean and full of plants. I know that there were over 100 plants because I would count them and I would do inventory on the plants. My mother was a plant mom. My dad would come and go. He would come to Los Angeles and go back to Guatemala. He would not allow art on the wall because it would damage the structure. I think that’s how we got so into placing plants everywhere. Steps, stairs, plants, very clean floors. Home looks like plants to me. All types, spider plants, ceramic pots, tropical plants, leafy thin plants, prayer plants in elephant pots, my mother would make me water them. I had to water them along with the hundreds of other plants around them. I shared a bedroom with my sister. I don’t see it as my place, I see it as our place.
Sergio: When did you begin to fantasize about prosperity and did you tie your vision to an image of a home and what inspired your fantasy?
Farah Sosa: For my dad, prosperity was about having electronics. A nice TV, a stereo, a keyboard. I am not attached to material stuff but when I aim in that direction, I think about my dad. He made me get a flat-screen TV. That’s what makes him happy. I do not fantasize about things but I think about it as an abundance of work and in terms of physical stuff, I want the proper cameras, lenses, technology, and resources to do my work properly.
Sergio: What does your home look like present-day?
Farah Sosa: I do not own the home, it is a rental. I live alone. I live in a fourplex and gentrification was beginning when I moved here. The owners have changed along the way. It was built in 1920. I want to say it’s Victorian with a white picket fence. It’s moss green, like a deteriorated sage green. It has red doors with white window frames. It’s a vertical plan. When you enter the living room you see a spider chandelier, to the right is a bedroom, and after, reaching the vertical end, is an office. Back in the living room, you can make a left to the kitchen, then a corridor lands at the other end of the place with a lush patio with a wood fence around it. In the summertime, the place is really hot and in the winter it’s really cold.
I want to own real estate, especially when I moved to Highland Park ten years ago. I was partnered with a white man and I thought it would be easier for him to get approved for a loan. He told me explicitly that he didn’t want to own real estate and I couldn’t do it alone because I wasn’t making enough money back then. I needed a partner and so it didn’t happen. I wanted a fourplex. At the time, they were about $600,000. I wanted to have an investment property so I could rent out the other units to create passive income in the future for when I am exhausted and all I want to do is take care of my plants. I inherited my mother’s green thumb but I didn’t do so on purpose, it just happened. When I am not working, the plants give me solace. I love to look at them. My love for a green space was not on purpose, it just happened and the pandemic contributed to it because when my friends moved, they would give me their plants. On my birthday, people bring me plants. My photo shoots are based on concepts around nature. I did a video shoot in my patio for a singer. I have diffusing white curtains because it’s more favorable for the plants. They are great props for my photo shoots.
I like the idea of investing in a property so that my green children can have a home but since my neighborhood is so unaffordable, I am now considering buying in places like Wisconsin or Kentucky but I do really like Highland Park. I’m not sure how to make my home happen in Highland Park. I recently changed my couch from a warm orange couch to a green velvet couch to attract more money into my future.
Sergio: Is there a connection between your former fantasy and your current reality?
Farah Sosa: The only difference between my fantasy and my reality is that I don’t own the property. I do have dedicated spaces for the green plants and also for my equipment. I visualized my place today with artificial intelligence (AI) using Midjourney and Discord. It was really impressive.
