SILENCIO

“Abríamos despacio la puerta blanca, y al cerrarla otra vez era como un viento, una libertad que nos tomaba de las manos, de todo el cuerpo y nos lanzaba hacia adelante. Entonces corríamos buscando impulso para trepar de un envión al breve talud del ferrocarril, encaramadas sobre el mundo contemplábamos silenciosas nuestro reino.”

Julio Cortázar, Final del juego.
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Crete, Chania 2020 / Cheapest room available.
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In today’s hyperconnected world, where noises, sounds and constant stimulation dominate our everyday, the concept of silence has developed an irreplaceable role in my life. In this chaotic overload and constant bombardment of visual and sonic inputs, silence provides a refuge for the mind.

Specially in the last three years, since the traumatic isolation period at the beginning of the pandemic, silence has been growing both inside and around me. Living in a city like Berlin, the perception of stillness was totally redefined when we were forced to be closed at home, in my case alone, which flooded my apartment and brain with silence.

Kos, Neratzia Castle 2022 / Silent ancient scream.
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I started taking long walks to break this absence of noise, trying to disconnect my brain and stimulate it with creativity. With a camera always on my shoulder, I captured the stillness of the city and the emptiness of its spaces. This started opening a nuance in my photography, in the way I would capture a city that I thought I knew already too well.

I reconnected with this “zuhause” through these captures, emphasizing on the beauty of the details to fill the silent “emptiness”. Through these details, the feeling of “standby” pops out: a mix of solitude, introspection and contemplation.

Berlin, Neukölln 2021 / Empty fountain and pigeons.
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This way of approaching reality kept growing in me as I started traveling solo more often. Traveling alone has been a very transformative experience for me, a big chance to grow and self-discovery.

The feeling of being silent in a hotel room, in a pretty empty beach or walking alone with a backpack on a dark street can be also very challenging. The perception transforms and I had moments of very high sensory feelings, which also felt paranoid at times.

Berlin, Landwehrkanal 2021 / Water three times.

Crete, Falassarna 2020 / Dry dead thistle.

Crete, Falassarna 2020 / Plastic will be there forever.

Berlin, Kreuzberg 2020 / Flowers to myself.

Crete, Chania 2020 / Watercolor napkin.

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I propose these images as a form of absence, using no clear reference or elements connecting the images but silence. Silence as an identity, an element that invites the viewers to contemplate and connect with the photographs on a deeper level, through details that might get lost or unnoticed in a noisy environment.

This series were taken between Berlin and my solo trips to Greece, during the last couple of years. An open personal project that started in the summer of 2020 and that reopens every time I need to reconnect with the silence that lives in me and my surroundings.

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