About the Project “People of Pablo Casanueva”
A project by Pablo Casanueva.
Between 2012 and 2015, the artist traveled through his municipality, Ribeseya, trying to find common traits (historical, linguistic, identity) and preserve them visually. Photography was the gateway to these encounters that allowed him to feel, and sometimes record, the memory of a generation between two worlds. He spoke with these people, and they told him about their lives with old words. They allowed him to see their photographic archives, their places, and their tasks. He portrayed them in their space, without intervention, without lighting. A documentary search, an honest and fair portrait. On the other hand, a personal and attentive look at forms. He spoke to them in their language. He spoke with them without investigative intent, prioritizing naturalness and closeness in conversation.
Revisiting the Images
He now returns to these images to give them new form and incorporate not only the chosen photograph but also those that were part of the photographic process of the portrait. He does not edit the proofs: the original camera shot. With this, he tries to find recurrent visual motifs and provide movement, a kind of cinematography. In this review process, he also finds some visual and sound recordings. In the former, he dilates time and removes color, like a dream in which the tasks and people are already ghosts. In the latter, voices accumulate in memory and occasionally leave words that evoke and construct the past (war, repression, work, history). The testimony of echoes of increasingly distant lives. In the creative process, he realizes that he always returns to these images and stories that were, and still are, a pillar of his and ours.