The Suspension of Time
In Devagar, Catarina Osório de Castro presents a set of square color photographs of varied dimensions, revealing a visual process of investigation in which she disassembles the physical, private and public space in their primordial elements and in their significant details.
The elemental geometrical shapes appear regularly as an effort to organize and to confer meaning to space. We sense, in each photograph, the suspension of time and a determinate movement towards the subject, towards the capturing of its essence.
The contrasting sunlight and the deep shadows also take part in this process of simplification of forms. Tridimensional elements are restricted to their bidimensional correspondents: a rock massif on a beach and a pyramidal funerary monument are converted to triangles.
Elements of vegetation are also recurrent. To the possibility of observing a whole tree, the artist counterposes images which result from a surgical double process of observation. Sectioned tree trunks reveal their elemental forms and allow for an observation of their interior, as if searching for their intimacy while, at the same time, showing, in their rings, the lengthy time of their growth.
The oscillation between public and private space is smoothened by a construction of intimacy in public spaces. The gesture of approximation to subjects and a slow, meticulous observation are the artist’s method of preference for the elaboration of her photographs.
Also at the level of form we observe an oscillation between poles. The recurring presence of water, in diverse contexts and with different plasticities, introduces a dimension of flow and accentuates the melancholic and poetic aspects of the work: a duvet dripping towards the floor, the hair of a friend or the undulating surface of a stone table.
As a whole, this series of images summons the observer to experience Catarina Osório de Castro’s marvel at the world around her and the enchantment that motivates the construction of this visual diary.
Bruno Pelletier Sequeira