I love a man, and when I love a man, what do I love? His body or what it represents? This man or the idea of man? Do I see in it what I want to be or do I project myself onto it? If I see myself in him, we are the same; if I see in him the desire to be like him, I surrender him to the hierarchical superiority of the man he is and that I am not. Do I want him or do I want to be him? This confusion I lend myself to questions my senses: am I the one who fails or is the failure in the assumption of what I have to be? Is it possible to represent this assumption? Can I use the mechanisms I have at my disposal to extract this preestablished idea from certain bodies?
2021
Awards
Best Portfolios — IMAGO LISBOA Photo Festival — Lisbon, Portugal, 2022
Exhibitions
a ilha / XYZ Books — Lisbon, Portugal, 2023
Livraria aberta — Porto, Portugal, 2022
Casa dos Crivos — Braga, Portugal, 2021
Escola das Artes da Universidade Católica Portuguesa — Porto, Portugal, 2021
Masc is a photographic series that speaks about assumptions about the naked male body and its representation in art, and specifically in photography. An open call was made for male people to be photographed in the studio, without clothes. There was no room for any choice on my part, all those who responded were invited. In this way, the bodies that exist in this series are of those who felt free to be photographed. This raises some questions that interest me:
What are the bodies that allow themselves to be represented? What makes a person feel comfortable being photographed naked? What is a male body and, more specifically, which is the most masculine body? And, ultimately, how does the artist's gaze, as a homosexual, influence and distort this representation?
It is important to reflect on how we perpetuate the hegemonic images of bodies that, as a society, we consider “acceptable.” Masc runs the risk of contributing to this perpetuation; but it is my intention above all to question why these specific bodies, based on the context from which they arise.
I love a man, and when I love a man, what do I love? His body or what it represents? This man or the idea of man? Do I see in it what I want to be or do I project myself onto it? If I see myself in him, we are the same; if I see in him the desire to be like him, I surrender him to the hierarchical superiority of the man he is and that I am not. Do I want him or do I want to be him? This confusion I lend myself to questions my senses: am I the one who fails or is the failure in the assumption of what I have to be? Is it possible to represent this assumption? Can I use the mechanisms I have at my disposal to extract this preestablished idea from certain bodies?
Masc is a photographic series that speaks about assumptions about the naked male body and its representation in art, and specifically in photography. An open call was made for male people to be photographed in the studio, without clothes. There was no room for any choice on my part, all those who responded were invited. In this way, the bodies that exist in this series are of those who felt free to be photographed. This raises some questions that interest me:
What are the bodies that allow themselves to be represented? What makes a person feel comfortable being photographed naked? What is a male body and, more specifically, which is the most masculine body? And, ultimately, how does the artist's gaze, as a homosexual, influence and distort this representation?
It is important to reflect on how we perpetuate the hegemonic images of bodies that, as a society, we consider “acceptable.” Masc runs the risk of contributing to this perpetuation; but it is my intention above all to question why these specific bodies, based on the context from which they arise.
2021
Awards
Best Portfolios — IMAGO LISBOA Photo Festival — Lisbon, Portugal, 2022
Exhibitions
a ilha / XYZ Books — Lisbon, Portugal, 2023
Livraria aberta — Porto, Portugal, 2022
Casa dos Crivos — Braga, Portugal, 2021
Escola das Artes da Universidade Católica Portuguesa — Porto, Portugal, 2021
