Dare to make the straight line perfect - Paloma Rincón
7/13/202651 min
Visual artist and photographer Paloma Rincón joins Radim to trace a creative life built on colour, contrast, and control. Raised in Mexico City and surrounded by handcraft, tactile materials, and a graphic designer uncle, Paloma fell first for the analog darkroom, then for the still-life sets she builds entirely by hand. ~
She talks candidly about the shock of moving to a "monochrome" Madrid at a young age, the disciplined self-reliance it forced on her, and how a chance pairing of a disco ball and a melon became one of her most iconic images.
The conversation moves from personal projects and happy accidents to the realities of commercial work, retouching, and surrendering control to a trusted team — closing on why she believes a distinct creative voice, not AI, will always be the thing that carries an artist through.
Takeaways
- Childhood surroundings shape creative instinct long before you recognise it — Paloma's love of colour, handcraft, and building spaces (rather than playing with dolls) runs through all her work today
- Moving somewhere "greyer" doesn't just change your surroundings — it can force a self-reliance and discipline that becomes a lifelong asset
- A signature style often lives in tension: Paloma's geometric precision sits deliberately against organic, fluid elements
- Analog training builds a physical, technical understanding of light and process that digital immediacy doesn't automatically teach
- The best juxtapositions — like the disco melon — often arrive as happy accidents inside a loosely defined creative "box," not a rigid plan
- Personal projects and commercial projects demand different relationships with control; knowing when to hold on and when to surrender is a craft in itself
- Retouching your own work can be meditative, but stepping back and handing it to others often produces a better result
- In an AI-saturated landscape, a distinctive creative voice — not the tool — remains the real differentiator
Daring Creativity. Podcast with Radim Malinic
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Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsPaloma Rincón· Guest0:00
[instrumental music] I always try to do the best project I can, but then I also have to understand what they are really expecting from me and how much freedom I'm going to be able to have, how much of my personal universe and voice they want to hear, and how aligned they are with my previous work or with that work that they are referencing. So it's all about understanding what's the scope of the project and what's rolling it, and understanding that I always try to do the best project I can with what I have and with what they want from me.
Radim Malinic· Host0:47
[upbeat music] Welcome to Daring Forever, a podcast about being human, wired for wonder, capable of courage, perpetually becoming. It's about the waves that knock us under and the strange, stubborn grace with which we surface. My name is Radim Malinic. I'm an author, creative, and an eternally curious human being on a mission to speak to incredible people whom I call forever daring humans, those in pursuit of an extraordinary life. Every week, I share an interview that is packed with amazing stories, value, and I can only ask you, how will you dare forever? This podcast is inspired