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In
the first period of my work, I focused on creating certain metaphors by
means of frontal portraits of fixed, direct stares, that exposed the
dignity of the models and, simultaneously, made evident the fragility
of their being: the countenance was a pretext to represent the human
condition. Portraits in which the loneliness and yet emotional firmness
of the subjects could be sensed and in which the glance established a
space of contradictions and ambiguities. In this series of portraits,
mainly of Guatemalans, the countenance served as a mirror in which I
looked at myself, wondered and searched for meaning. In those
portraits, the strength of the glance lies on the power it has to
reverse my own and this power reaches its most intense value if it
manages to reverse the spectator’s as well, with the same strength and
impetus as it presents to him. To the observer, to discover himself in
this internal, silent glance, accompanied by this immobile countenance
that stares back at him, means to become aware that we all share a
common destiny. A reflection on beauty as fragility, memory as pain and
time as a continuous fall. Photography presents death with open eyes.
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