#visualethnography

El laberinto

The stories that Cristóbal tells in The Labyrinth are all firsthand experiences. The film was built around one sound recording I made in 2012, one year after our first meeting. That shooting was a strong moment, materializing hours of discussion in other contexts. It was the first line of the film to come, from which everything unfolded.

Hand-crafting was key while editing this film, the playfulness of assembling the materials. I realized while doing it that asking for the permission to use these images was to de-politize them. The act of appropriation makes sense, on its own. If those US TV series have colonized our imaginaries why would I go and ask them if they would allow my criticism? It’s not delinquency but détournement, it’s political.

2018 ‧ Short ‧ 21 mins

Rita Salt is an American tattoo artist who I believe shares her work and life very openly on the internet and social media. Rita is always travelling around the world to work in various tattoo shops globally and she makes this public through posting on her stories on Instagram. We can also see how much she travels for work by looking at the tagged location of her posts. Not only does she post her tattoos, but Rita also posts images of her sketchbooks sometimes with captions about her thoughts on the place she’s visited. I get the impression that she has a very casual and laid back approach to how she shares her work life and personal life on Instagram through posting a collection of her tattoos, sketchbook drawings and also photographs of herself.