JOSE MENDES DE ALMEIDA

Lisbon, PORTUGAL

In its essence, photography is an act of voyeurism. To catch reality by stealing it’s light is an indiscretion made with sensibility. Recording an image transforms a transient ray of light into a permanent object that, by its nature, may induce feelings or ideas that give a meaning to it’s own existence. In this sense, photography should provoke a reaction, must stimulate our sensibility and be free of any pre-determined concept of beauty.

And it mostly starts with serendipity. Whether images or ideas, it is through this quest for something that touches your mind that the process begins. This initial impression usually evolves into a project that will take time to mature and, finally, will come to shape in a series of images. It may be shot in half an hour or take years of careful and, sometimes, occasional capture. But, in the end, it all will be around a unifying concept, a personal evolution of an idea. Still all these series of images are constructed around a central perspective. They try to show the unseen, mostly what was so near but nevertheless so distant. Unawareness may be the definition. From a room with a history in its walls, to a tale of life and death, these images try to disclose what you might have glimpsed but never fully seen.

www.mendesdealmeida.com