“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.”
Marcel Proust
Five years ago, Portugal did present itself as a new landscape in my life – both literally and metaphorically. Since then, I have photographed exclusively along a very small stretch of its southern coastline. Returning to this specific place, I’ve sought out its nuances. In doing so, I have peeled back layers of how I see, and how I experience this magical environment. The results of my slight obsession have evolved into two distinct series. Here are two images from Praia Piquinia, a body of work focusing on a singular, secluded beach front in which all of the pictures are taken from essentially the same elevated angle. What the still life was for Morandi, this beach is for me. From a distance, I observe the variables: light, weather, time of day, the ebb and flow of the ocean, and the sunbathers, unaware, below my large format camera. The images are shot vertically, a departure from the traditional, horizontal format in landscape photography. It puts my subject matter in the form of a portrait – an ongoing record of this ethereal yet playful nook in nature over the minutes, the days, the years.
Ultimately, I try to instill an element of time within these captured moments… visceral time, elastic from one image to another. And always, I seek to have new eyes.