“If we opened people up, we’d find landscapes.
If we opened me up, we’d find beaches.”
— Agnès Varda, Les plages d’Agnès

A la orilla de mí is a photographic research project developed as a photobook. It seeks to establish a metaphorical relationship between the states of the sea and my different emotional states.

It explores correspondences between landscapes and portraits — between the ocean and the body. An introspection on mutability: the movements of the tide, the swing of the waves, and the fluctuation of emotions and feelings.

I let the mask fall into the sea and photograph what it returns to me. Through frontal self-portraits, I search for the present moment. Just as one sadness is not the same as another sadness, one wave is not the same as another wave. Through photography, I connect with emotion and remain present — like standing in front of something that never ends.

There are a thousand images of me, like waves that come and go, erasing any trace behind. The foam of time. What remains when emotions are gone? Are there different states within the same sea? Am I made of emotions? What emotion does the water hold? Can I find in the sea the image of my own emotion?

The project was selected for the Concurso Artes Visuales 2018 (FNA) and was a finalist for the Premio Fundación Larivière in 2019. The work has been exhibited in Argentina, Germany, and Spain.