Pictorialismo
By María Tudela Bermudez
“There is something nostalgic and beautiful in the decadent, and perhaps, it is the reason that causes almost all my shots to end up having a decadent air. From the beginning, I treated my photographs with the same processing, The goal was to give them a more artistic than technical character, and more suggestive than descriptive”.
– María Tudela Bermudez
Without a doubt, there is something nostalgic and beautiful in decadence, and perhaps that premise is the reason why almost all my shots end up having a decadent air. I documented and explored through the manipulation how to turn a current capture into an old but timeless capture at the same time. I still think that what matters in photography is not the camera or the processing, but the author’s way of looking, and above all, what and how far they will tell us with his gaze.
From the beginning, I treated my photographs with the same processing; the objective was to give them
a more artistic than technical character and more descriptive than documentary.
For this, I use selective blurring, the lack of sharpness, the conversion to black and white and textures, tools that allow me to get away from reproducing reality.
To my great surprise, sometime after taking photographs, I discovered the concept and artistic movement of the mid-nineteenth century, called Pictorialism, with which I share many characteristics.
I highlight as themes present in my works cloudy or rainy landscapes, sea mists, fogs, or all those atmospheric conditions in which the image which not allowed to be clear.
A nurse by profession, I discovered photography by chance a little over a decade ago, and since then, I have dedicated part of my free time to take photos. Then, a few years ago, I decided to show my images on social networks, opening up a range of opportunities to make my work visible and publicize it.
“Maria’s work effectively becomes an invitation: her vision is distinguished from elemental evocation. It seduces so that the voice that emerges is another, that of the spectator: a response. Even if it is from a commonplace. Through the polysemy of the sites she chooses to shoot, and the atmosphere, It gives us a way for revealing our inner selves”.
-Flavia Iquira-Pizarro. Laana basis.
I do not follow norms or rules, and I confess that I am more interested in suggesting and provoking than photographic techniques.
I manipulate the image to offer a vintage but timeless photograph, evocative and melancholic. Although ultimately, it is not the image that evokes. It is our own memories and experiences; the photo is only a channel at that precise moment, a vehicle between the viewer and their memories. Although it seems that I take photographs, in reality, they take me.
This series demonstrates my admiration for this movement, which has influenced my way of understanding photography as an instrument of expression despite being unaware of it.
