Photojournalist Guillermo Cervera's first solo exhibition reveals the more offbeat side of life

Cervera photographed a woman hanging off a railing in New York during Hurricane Sandy (Guillermo Cervera)

Guillermo Cervera made his name photographing conflict zones. For the past two decades, the Spanish photojournalist has covered subjects from the war in Bosnia to the Arab Spring to Darfur's refugees.

To counter the horrors he has witnessed, the 46-year-old spends his down time capturing the more offbeat side of life – work that features in his first solo exhibition in New York this month.

The 46-year-old took the shot above in 2008 in the Prado Museum in his native Madrid as part of a series about women looking at paintings of other women in galleries around the world. "I liked to photograph the similarities between the paintings and the museum visitors," says Cervera. "In this case they are copying the gestures of Venus."

He photographed a woman hanging off a railing in New York during Hurricane Sandy in 2012. "The wind was blowing strongly and she was playing with it, jumping, and then the wind kept her up in the air for a couple of seconds," he recalls.

Cervera says: "I hope that whoever looks at my photos gets a feeling inside. That they do not just think, 'What a pretty picture,' but 'What an original image.'"

Always on the move, Cervera hasn't called anywhere home for more than three years. "I search for things to transmit a feeling; for people to stare at, to think about," he says. "To feel."

An exhibition of Cervera's work is showing at Anastasia Photo, New York (anastasia-photo.com), until 4 January

Images courtesy Anastasia Photo