Gigi Engalla
She works across editorial design, street photography, nonfiction video, and creative writing, exploring how stories travel across mediums and geographies. Having lived, studied, and worked in more than twenty countries, her approach to visual communications is globally-informed, stubbornly curious, and always adaptive.
gigi@engalla.com
@gigiengalla
Design
A photography series from one month in Bhutan where I studied “Gross National Happiness,” shared lunch with a monk, hiked up to Tiger’s Nest, sang kareoke every weekend, and met beautiful people along the way.
Passing Through
- A zine of photographs and reflections across 6 different countries—France, Japan, Morocco, the Philippines, the UAE, and the USA. In collaboration with Tommy Bordes.
-
CONVO Magazine
-
An independent publication dedicated to uplifting creative Gen Z voices in art, music, fashion, and technology.
Issue 01: Creativity During COVID
Issue 02: Metamodern
Festivals of Happiness
- A GIS project that explored Bhutan's festivals as living archives of tradition by mapping festival locations in relation to different factors including population density, distance to cultural heritage sites, natural landscape features, built infrastructure, and Gross National Happiness scores per district.
Photo
- Having been to over 20 countries before the age of 22, I’ve had to accept that permanence is mostly a myth. Traveling has forced me to adapt, make do, and get comfortable being uncomfortable. Even though very little stays the same, one thing keeps proving itself true: the more I learn, the less I know. As Anthony Bourdain wrote in The Nasty Bits, this realization is “both frustrating and addicting.”
- Photography is my way of making peace with life’s uncertain and ephemeral. It may be a futile attempt to possess those fleeting moments or just proof that I was paying attention. Either way, I keep doing it.
- Bhutan
- Thailand
- Philippines
- Morocco
- Japan
- United States
- Egypt
- Indonesia
- U.A.E.
- Mexico
- Italy
- France
Video
The Writings on The Stalls
U.S.A. / 2025 / 9 min
U.S.A. / 2025 / 9 min
- A short film on "latrinalia" aka bathroom graffiti. Shot on location in Berkeley, California.
Oaxaca: Una Carta de Amor
Mexico / 2021 / 2 min
Mexico / 2021 / 2 min
- A montage of my trip to Oaxaca—reuniting with friends in one of the most beautiful cities in the world.
Contact
gigi@engalla.com
YouTube