“I only went out for a walk, and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.”

– John Muir, Scottish-born American naturalist

Portrait of landscape phographer David Julià, wearing a black beanie and jacket, smiling outdoors against a dramatic Scottish loch and rocky hillside backdrop.

Landscape photographer raised between the Ebro River and the Mediterranean Costa Brava. 


I explore nature with an impressionist spirit, seeking to represent the sensations it conveys rather than its exact image.


Scotland and its Atlantic coasts have a special influence on my photography. Unlike the Mediterranean, there the weather rarely remains stable for long and the light can change its mood in a matter of minutes due to recurrent winds and the passing of clouds and fog. There is something about these dynamic landscapes that captures me, even when thousands of kilometers separate us. In those natural spaces I reconnected with something I felt the first time I picked up a camera: the intuition to use movement and create images in a more expressive way.

ABOUT ME

Origins

My relationship with photography began, before Scotland, as something personal and inward, exploring identity and my place in the world through distorted self-portraits on reflective surfaces. And little by little, almost without realizing it, I redirected the camera outwards. As I spent more time outdoors, immersed in the landscape, observing light, colours and textures, I realized that this was something I was missing, as if moving slowly through natural spaces with a camera in my hands rebalanced an internal restlessness that I hadn't yet recognized. And in this slower pace, I found a different way of seeing and being.

A softly blurred, close-up self-portrait of a person with eyes closed, rendered in warm amber tones, evoking introspection and the early experimental work exploring identity through distorted imagery.
An abstract ICM photograph of silhouetted figures against a blazing orange and yellow sunset, with sweeping motion blur streaking across dark coastal rocks, creating a dreamlike, painterly effect.
A soft, painterly landscape photograph using intentional camera movement, depicting layered misty mountains and golden meadows in muted blue, teal, and yellow tones, evoking a quiet, diffused impression of the scene.
ABOUT ME

Movement and Time

Movement is the foundation of my photographic experience. Through intentional camera movement and slow exposures, I let the wind and tides and changing light write themselves on the sensor like brushstrokes of nature on a canvas. This way I manage to create all my images in the camera itself, preferring to enjoy the time exploring a Mediterranean forest, an Alpine trail or a Scottish valley, rather than spend too much time post-processing in front of a screen. The result is a diffuse impression that is often reminiscent of impressionist paintings or abstract art, the kind of image that contains a feeling rather than an actual place, like an imperfect memory that lingers after the moment has passed.                       

the journey

An abstract ICM photograph of a lone bare tree surrounded by swirling snow and icy terrain, rendered in monochromatic whites and greys, conveying the raw, elemental force of a Scottish winter landscape.


It was a solo winter scooter journey from Spain to Scotland that highlighted this connection between nature and movement. The experience of exploring the Isle of Skye and the Outer Hebrides became The Hebridean Trace, a series born from the excitement of exploring those distant, unknown islands steeped in legend, and from the feeling that intuitive movement was the most natural and expressive way I had to represent what I saw and felt. The trace that the journey left in me is an idea that I return to whenever the distractions of everyday life take over: it reminds me of the importance of slowing down, spending more time outdoors, paying attention to what surrounds us and creating, whether that takes place on a walk among trees or sitting on a dune while a gentle winter sun warms my face.

David Julià standing on a rocky white sand beach, camera raised to his eye, facing crashing waves under a dramatic cloudy sky on the Scottish Atlantic coast.
A figure in a blue jacket standing beside a parked scooter on a quiet road, looking out toward snow-dusted rugged mountains under an overcast sky, evoking the solitude of a solo winter journey through Scotland.

Fluid Landscapes

The constant flow of a river, the erosive force of the sea, the changing light of a sunset, the color of landscapes with the passage of the seasons: nature is never static. By using the movement of the camera and slow exposures, it is as if I allow a little of that flow to seep into the photo. But before the photo, the flow has to be in me: walking slowly, tuning in to what is around me, letting myself be carried by the space and the movement. This is the heart of Fluid Landscapes, a creative practice that reawakened in the Hebrides and which I have carried with me wherever I go ever since.

An ICM photograph of a forest interior, with tall trees streaking upward in deep golden yellows and warm browns, a burst of light at the centre piercing through the canopy in an almost supernatural glow.
A long-exposure photograph of a calm ocean surface at dusk, with gentle wave patterns rendered as smooth silky streaks in deep teal and soft rose-gold tones, conveying stillness and the quiet passage of time.

Awards & Exhibitions​

2026 - Notworking Awards, Best Photography Project Award

2024 - Swiss Art Expo, Zurich, Switzerland. Group exhibition 

2024 - Casa del Arte, Palma de Mallorca, Spain. Group exhibition

2018 - "Practice," short film, Youth Mental Health Arts Film Festival, Scotland. Written and directed by Laura MacDougall, filmed by me

​​2016 -  Genesis Landscape Photo Competition. 1 of the 5 winners selected to exhibit alongside Sebastião Salgado's work​ at CaixaForum Girona

2012 - Inund’Art Festival, Girona, Spain.  Group exhibition


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