Rodri Maguchi: When Rock, Light, and Identity Become One Frame

Dubai has become a city where artists arrive not only to exhibit, but to transform. In a place defined by constant motion—new districts, new audiences, new cultural rhythms—creative work is often pushed into quick definitions and convenient labels. Yet some voices resist simplification. They build slowly, carefully, and with an insistence on meaning.

One of those voices belongs to Rodrigo Alpizar Sanchez, known publicly as Rodri. Born in Mexico in 1994 and based in Dubai for the past three years, Rodri describes himself as an artist and passionate photographer, but his identity extends beyond the studio. He is also a lawyer, philanthropist, and entrepreneur—roles that might look separate on paper, yet in his world they form a single line: a vision expressed through multiple disciplines, all moving toward the same purpose.

At the center of that vision is Rodri Maguchi (https://rodrimaguchi.com/), a photography collection he describes as “Islamic rock photography.” The phrase is striking, but for Rodri it is not a slogan. He explains it as a concept he first created as a frame in his mind, then translated into photographs that “look like paintings.” The work does not simply borrow a painterly aesthetic for decoration. It uses that quality to express inner reality—how memory, emotion, and identity layer themselves over the visible world.

The collection’s language is shaped by contrasts: environment and psychology, realism and imagination, order and fragmentation. Rodri speaks about divisions that can exist inside a person—how the mind separates experiences, how identity can feel split into different directions—yet his work aims to bring those parts back into coherence. In this sense, photography becomes a method of integration. Light is not merely technical; it is symbolic. In Rodri Maguchi, light reads as a pathway—an attempt to move from heaviness toward clarity.

Even the name carries personal meaning. Rodri connects “Maguchi” to the power of the heart and the origin of love, suggesting that this body of work is driven by more than technique. It is anchored in emotion: what can be felt immediately, without being overexplained. This is what gives the collection its intensity—images that are not content to be “beautiful,” but want to be true.

Music runs through this vision with equal force. Rodri is a guitarist and is developing his own rock band in Dubai. He speaks about the electric guitar not as an instrument, but as a kind of presence—its punch, its directness, the way its sound “reveals its own essence.” In a vivid metaphor, he compares that sound to a dinosaur’s roar: primal, unmistakable, impossible to ignore. For Rodri, rock is not background noise. It is a way to push through suffering, create love, and climb toward illumination. That philosophy bleeds into his imagery. He describes his creative process as cinematic—each situation like a “rock movie,” each work carrying the energy of a “rock song.”

A key milestone for the collection came with its exhibition at World Art Dubai 2025, where Rodri Maguchi entered a larger professional art context in the city. Rodri notes that the collection was curated with the involvement of top Dubai artists and professionals, and that the experience felt like a turning point. It wasn’t only a display of photographs; it was a moment where his worlds converged. During the exhibition, he also had the opportunity to play guitar with friends—bringing sound into the same space as image and reinforcing the collection’s underlying message: art becomes real when it becomes lived.

Rodri’s story includes an element uncommon in many creative narratives: an ongoing legal and philanthropic connection to his home country. He speaks about supporting vulnerable people in Mexico through legal activity, taking on different kinds of cases, including labor matters. He frames this work not as a performance of goodness, but as responsibility—an effort to create opportunities and protect dignity. In his worldview, ambition must mean something beyond personal gain; it must be connected to impact.

That same drive is visible in his entrepreneurial work in Dubai through his company QALB. Rodri describes QALB as part of the structure that supports his vision: developing projects, selling artworks, and building a merchandise line that includes T-shirts. It positions his creative identity not only as artistic expression, but as a sustainable ecosystem—an approach in which the artist builds the infrastructure around the work rather than waiting for ideal conditions.

Rodri also identifies as a Muslim and a convert, and this spiritual orientation quietly shapes the inner framework of his perspective. The combination of devotion and rock intensity is precisely what makes Rodri Maguchi unusual: it holds contemplation and rebellion in the same frame, without forcing either one to shrink.

Looking ahead, Rodri speaks about expanding beyond photography—becoming a performing artist through acting, continuing to develop his band, and consolidating himself as a serious artist in Dubai and the Middle East. The ambition is clear, but the tone is equally important: he is not chasing attention for its own sake. He is constructing a life where art, responsibility, and identity move in the same direction.