Aina Gómez Pizá was born in Palma at a hospital that no longer exists. “Son Dureta”, she says. “It’s being redeveloped now.” Much has changed in Mallorca since Aina was born in 1983, but some things, like her connection to the island and her passion for storytelling, have remained constant.
Aina left Mallorca at 18 to study in Barcelona. She spent ten years there, then moved to Madrid and later the UK, before returning to the island she calls home. “When I left, I was a wide-eyed girl from Mallorca stepping into the world,” she says. “Now I’m back, and I’ve had some hard things happen to me, but I still have that sense of wonder from when I was younger.”
Aina works as a photographer, specialising in shooting portraits for families and businesses. She sees her work as all about connection, “and telling people’s stories, whether it’s through words or images.”
Aina didn’t jump straight into photography. Her first love was filmmaking, particularly documentaries. She began directing and producing films about people; their cultures, histories, and lives. “I’m drawn to real stories,” she says. “The messiness and the beauty of human experience.”
Love, Film, and Loss
During the making of one of these documentaries, she met her future husband, Salomon. He was part of the crew, acting in a fiction piece where, she laughs, “he was completely bald, no facial hair, with white nail varnish, playing an assassin.” But his charisma made an impression, and the two soon became a couple. “We just clicked. And it got serious, fast.”
Their time together was creatively fruitful; they shot documentaries in Spain and Peru, travelled for work, and supported each other’s careers. But just as their daughter Mayim was born, Salomon fell ill. “At first, it didn’t seem serious,” Aina says. “We thought he’d recover. But things changed very quickly.” He died when their daughter was just seven months old.
Aina speaks of the experience with the clarity of someone who has had to process deep grief while still functioning. “I didn’t have time to grieve properly,” she says. “There was a baby who needed feeding, who didn’t understand what I was going through. So I put the grief in a box and kept going.” She returned to work just two weeks after the funeral, throwing herself into running a language school she’d helped launch. “It had to be a success, and it was. But that’s how I coped: I didn’t stop.”
The emotional importance of photography crystallised for Aina while planning Solomon’s funeral. She realised she had almost no pictures of him with their daughter. “Eventually, I found one, taken by a friend at a birthday party. Just one photo. It’s so precious.” That moment changed her professional path. “People think of photography as a luxury, but I see it as a need. Especially for mothers. We’re always the ones taking the photos, we’re never in them.”
Capturing Real Life
This belief led her to build a photography business that captures families as they are—messy, beautiful, imperfect. “It’s not about waiting until you’ve lost five kilos,” she says. “Your kids don’t care what you look like. They care that you were there.”
Since returning to Mallorca, Aina has also developed a commercial branch to her photography practice. “When I moved to the UK, I didn’t know anyone. So I went out and networked. Most of the people I met were business owners who said they needed headshots. But they needed something deeper: photos that showed who they are and why clients should trust them.” She now offers “content creation” days on the island and abroad, helping individuals and small business owners build a strong visual identity. “It’s about showing up,” she says. “Not as an avatar or some AI-generated version of yourself, but as you.” Her work is grounded in authenticity, even as she experiments with tools like Lightroom’s AI-enhanced editing features. “We have to keep up with the times, of course. But in personal branding, you can’t fake everything. If it’s all artificial, what’s left of you?”
Legacy in Motion
The loss of her husband and the desire to preserve his memory for their daughter has sparked a new idea: a documentary about Salomon’s family. “My daughter never got to know her father or his side of the family,” Aina says.
“And they were fascinating people.” Her daughter’s surname, Shang Gómez, hints at this complex heritage—a Chinese circus artist adopted her paternal grandfather, became an acrobat, and travelled the world performing. “There’s not a drop of Chinese blood, but the name tells a story. And I want to tell it, for her.”
The new project, still in development, will use family footage, fragments of Salomon’s past films, and personal narrative to weave together a portrait of heritage, identity, and loss. “It’s more than a tribute,” she explains. “It’s giving my daughter something tangible she can carry with her.”
When she’s not working, Aina is rediscovering the island through her daughter’s eyes. “She’s eleven now and a total performer, singing, dancing, acting. It’s in her blood.” They like to go swimming and kayaking when possible. “We like the water. We just don’t like the sand!” As Mallorca continues to change, Aina’s connection to the island has evolved. “I didn’t come back because I was nostalgic. I came back because it felt right. And even though life hasn’t been easy, things are flowing again.” You can find Aina’s work on Instagram at @photoshootinmallorca.