#finalindependentproject

Hey there everyone! Long time no post, I have to apologise for this since I have been pretty busy with my readings and essay writing for the first half of the semester. It is with great sorrow in my heart that I have to tell you the following: Home will no longer be my final MA project. I convinced myself of this two weeks ago, as I realised it would be practically impossible to make justice to the ideas I have in my mind for it. Instead, I’ve decided to do that in the future as a personal project. Well, that’s it in a few words. There’s no more home. Now to the big news. 

I’ve decided to do my final project on a topic that I’m really passionate about and that involves my heritage: the representation of indigenous people on the media. I will do a hybrid project: 10 portraits and a 10 minute documentary film. I’ve envisioned the pictures to be part of an online campaign, to be printed as ads and to be included in a photo book. In addition to that they will be stills from the documentary where I will interview experts (anthropologists, geographers, etc.) on their ideas and knowledge about indigenous groups in different parts of the planet and interviews with the models who will represent people they know very little about. This project will focus on the indigenous groups of Panama. 

The whole idea is to prove through a visual experiment that we are all part of the same tribe in the sense that we all feel identified with a specific group and this fosters in us a sense of belonging and identity. 

The representation of indigenous peoples around the world has almost always been linked to colonisation, which is why I want to distance myself from that idea and create portraits that are not related to that concept. I already had a studio shoot on Tuesday with a wonderful model, my good friend Sistha, who agreed to pose wearing objects that belong to the indigenous tribes of Panama.