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Social Identity

We all have conceptual thoughts about who we are and what our own identity is. Those same thoughts can apply to our self-concepts when we look at the groups we belong to and our own internal self-identity.

Social identity theory proposes that, when acting in groups, we define ourselves in terms of our group membership and seek to have our group valued positively relative to other groups. So if we define ourselves in terms of our nationality (e.g., as American, Australian or British), we want our country to look good compared to other countries.

The concept of identity is used in many different contexts and covers a deal. A general description that is utilized in social sciences refers to the term as ‘an individual's comprehension of him or herself as a discrete, separate entity’. More importantly, when the term is expanded to represent not an individual, but a minority group, it takes on a political role. Through these politics and the onset of postcolonial critique, minority groups claimed their rights in all aspects of society.

However, in our unequal world, many people find themselves in groups that are devalued compared to others – for instance, black people in a racist world. What do they do then?

Social identity theory argues that this depends upon two factors. The first is permeability. If we believe that we can still progress in society despite our group membership (i.e., group boundaries are permeable) we will try to distance ourselves from the group and be seen as an individual. If there is no chance of advancement (because group boundaries are impermeable), we will begin to identify with the group and act collectively with fellow group members to improve our situation.

Today, identity politics may be claimed to have served their purpose by creating a place for artists belonging to minority groups.

(from Richard Jenkins, ‘Social Identity -fourth edition’ 2014).

My series approach this notion of social identity within the small group of people by questioning who defined me? is it my family, my group of friends or myself?

Dissemination

My images right now are a single edition, because they portrait family for me is very difficult to think about the dissemination of these images. Yet the identity of the photographs, the concept behind the work makes them somehow a public work that could be disseminated.

Small galleries spaces who support post-graduated artists and perhaps commercials galleries were the first placed I think about my prints.

But also shows and awards focus on feminist thematics or exhibitions about self-portraits, selfies and new forms of representation (On January, Saatchi Gallery concluded the #SaatchiSelfie global competition).

Who might the audience be..

People I will be reaching online. The use of mirrors is very popular online so perhaps creating a new Instagram account with all the photographs I created.

Other artists, looking into the staging photography. Fine art photographers searching how art and photography blends. Curators. Or anyone interested in portraiture or into the identity thematic.

How to present Ghostly Present

The first approach to editing my images was as a narrative, I gather together all the images and select them by location: Italy, Rochester and indoors. I did not feel right on the doing so, as I wasn’t doing a book. And as point out in several tutorials, location was something not fundamental in what I want to transmit with my images.

Away from book narrative, I planned to group the images, where the main images were the staged portraits, and use the other shoots as supporters of their narrative. To unify them was the mirror size in the center of each image. As an alternative different photograph sizes.

Different sizes (above)

In this regard, I needed to decide on what were the limited sizes.If the small sizes would have been taken into consideration, I would have mirror frame them in this Wilko frames. Yet, I wasn’t really sure, and the idea seemed too wacky.

A reason for to group them in the way shown about was due to the visit at the National Gallery. ‘Pistoia Santa Trinità’ is an altarpiece I really liked, It has the main image and then the different stories at the bottom of it. I found it very inspiring, as my images are all different yet they support each other.

The problem was that I still wanted to use all the images. And I wasn’t really editing, instead, I was taking more images. At home, I also tried to add the mirror in the space and be interactive with the audience (below).

I went then to see Wolfgang Tillmans, and his position of the photographs and the dimensions of them were just what I thought I was looking for.

I printed all the images in different dimensions (repeating the pictures) and I just kept with the idea of group them but just spread around the whole wall. The a2 in the main images was discussed and I tried later to go bigger, with a minimum of an a4. I still didn’t know how to hang them, if clipping them, nailing them (it gives a sense that the photographs are not still in one place, they are temporary) or frame them.

(from Family Of Mam exhibition) hang them in the space, far from the walls?

I liked this exhibition where the artist mixed poster sizes with frames. Yet still wasn’t sure if it would be a good dissemination of the images.

Another idea was to group the four images at the center and the rest of the images spread around them.

None of these ideas were working out for me, so after Easter, I just printed in a0 just to see how they might look big. And I really liked that they give a sense of window like. So I came back to the idea to recall master paintings also within the dimensions. I tried with glossy paper and it was just not working out with the lighting, while matt was fading the photographs. So I would be printing in satin.

As soon as I determinate those factors I realized that I had two completely practices going on in my series, the staged portraits, and the documentary-ich one. So I took the decision to present only four images and work with them in the space.

next to each other or two and two on top of each other?

or three together (in that order) and my solo photograph separate from the others?

Once I printed the four images in satin a0, I noticed the amount of noise in some of the image and a blur constant in all the photographs (not seen digitally). There were color distortions that were not linked to the settings or editing of the image. This really restricted how big the images would have been -print the only clean image big while leaving three in a4. Another factor, pointed by the tutor, was that the four images might work separately, individually but not together because of the different light source?. A suggestion was to simply find a visual concept to explain the blur (ie. the viewers see my world with my eyes -not clean, a more organic and less mechanical approach) and leave the images as they are. But I really don’t feel comfortable in risking that way at the final stage of my project. So I just came back to one of the initial scheme: A0 on top of three a4 prints.

Having a4 prints made me unsure on my decision of clipping or nailing my work, so I took the decision to try mounting all of them. I believe this scheme is good on my photographs’ concept: I am the main subject, supported by family and friends.

Initially, I wanted all the images to be colour edited, so I looked into Colour scheme to have a consistent colour, this are the ones I felt looked better with my images:

Analogous Colour Scheme are easy to take advantage of in landscapes and exteriors as they are often found in nature. Often one colour can be chosen to dominate, a second to support, and a third along with blacks, whites and grey tones to accent.

Tetradic Colour Scheme consists of four colors arranged into two complementary pairs. The result is a full palette with many possible variations. As with most of these color harmonies, one color is usually dominant.

By adding a 35% mask of black and white, and leaving only few spots on full colour, according to the Tetradic scheme, to highlight people and primary colours, to balance at best the overall of images. Yet by doing this the images become very dark, I didn’t like in the domestic space. Also because the inside images came out mostly dark themselves.

I had to add brightness in the inside images, even if the setting of the camera were for indoors shooting. I replaced the black and white mask with the original colour. An extra edit was to colour balance the whites, another issue as the colours were either too cold or too warm.

Different editing were done according to single images. Especially in the staged portraits, where I changed some of my mirror reflection due to the noise caused by the low lighting and the colour editing.

women's identity in art

By the late 60s, the definition of womanhood has been re-written and taken into control of the proper image.

One of the books I read about women role was ‘The Feminine Mystique’ from 1963, It was written by Betty Friedan which is widely credited with sparking the beginning of second-wave feminism in the United States.

In 1989 Laura Mulvey, a British feminist film theorist, wrote “visual and other pleasures”, in it the author spoke about Frida Kalho and Tina Modotti, and she pointed out the way in which domestic images of women should be created:

“Women artist can embrace the domestic and personal, accepting their sphere and using it as a source or imaginary and experience, simultaneously playing tribute to the historic relegation of women. But this position can, and should, lead very quickly to the analysis of the female condition rather than the mere celebration of it”

And so with this quote placed into perspective that in my work I am talking about expectations of the woman role, seeing from a contemporary perspective in which the woman is expected to provide not to support the domestic. Looking into the representation of this transition of expectation from one generation to another, and explore the mental state of women doing this, especially those from another country.

The aspect of a transition within the generations would be important in my conceptual images, because even if I am 23 now I still feel this transition hasn’t really got into the final state. Yet I had very little artists that recreate a faithful depiction of this. We have Sally Mann’s body of work but yet their images present very rough characters, so is very hard to identify with them, is more about judging this images sitter. Then there are many who take this passage as “the end of innocence”, which is really a male gaze perspective. So I narrowed down to those who avoid thematics of sexuality (not the same as gender) and narrate the psychology of this passage.

Sarah Jones is a visual artist working primarily in the realm of photography. Her practice is deeply rooted in art history, and she draws influence from topics such as Psychoanalysis, adolescence, and the Victorian period.

The Dining Room (Francis Place) I is the first image from an ongoing project Jones began in 1996 with the assistance of three teenage girls, Camilla, Rohan and Stephanie. In this project she explored the relationships between a staged pose or gesture, a gaze and a person’s individual character. As the series progresses and photographs are taken over formative years in the girls’ lives, their mid adolescence, their appearances change. The creation of identity through appearance is a central preoccupation for teenagers and the series partially documents these changes. Their relationship to the environment which supports and nurtures them is ambiguous.

Julia Fullerton-Batten is a German fine art photographer who “Teenage Stories” expressed the transition from girlhood to womanhood with surrealist photographs of towering adolescents.

She street-cast models with no formal experience and captured images that “portray the emotional dynamics of the female adolescent.” The renderings offer drama and humor, banal moments and introspection. These teenagers are simply surviving this stage of life, while growing up and past their surroundings.

Tokyo-based photographer Monika Mogi captures raw and honest images that explore the period of transition from girlhood to adulthood. The 22-year-old artist is a self-taught photographer and has been taking pictures since she was 15. Mogi lived in California before moving back to Japan when she was 12 years old. So in her images, there is depicted this transition yet explored as total freedom.

Conceptual, staged documentary, constructive?

“Conceptual art, sometimes simply called conceptualism, is art in which the concept(s) or idea(s) involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic and material concerns.” - Wikipedia.

“Constructed photography includes photomontage, staged imagery, image-text works…any photographic imagery wherein the conceptual engineering of the artist is clearly evident” - Liz Wells, Photography a Critical Introduction, 1997.

“Documentary photography usually refers to a popular form of photography used to chronicle events or environments both significant and relevant to history and historical events as well as everyday life. It is typically covered in professional photojournalism, or real life reportage, but it may also be an amateur, artistic, or academic pursuit.” - Wikipedia.

Throughout my process, the series has evolved from the conceptual to single documentary about the subjects, taking inspiration from surrealist and symbolic artworks.

Most of the artist seen who are classified as conceptual, follow a single ideology/theory. A single story. The artist does not unpin others stories but their own. Sophie Calle, for example, a figure that I have been looking up since the very beginning of my practice, each project present a single narrative, that she takes from personal experience. Jeff Wall, another artist that I have been approaching, presents tableaux images, again single images that tell a particular story that yet not relate to another nor tell about the subjects captured (as they are hired as actors). It’s the theories or methodologies behind, as micro-gestures, that unite the images.

I believe I can be a hybrid of the three, subjective ideology, based on the sitter stories that construct a photographic series.

Ghostly Present

Statement:

Mery David is a Venezuelan, conceptual artist, based in London. She shows portraits where she performances for the camera.

Mirrors have been a conceptual contrast between the representation of trustiness and the belief they possess supernatural powers that distort reality. They can show us how we look like but also they can be portraits to another dimension. A dimension where the individuals reflect their loneliness and their distance to others.

Based on this notion of loneliness and feminist theories on the role of the women in the family sphere, 'Ghostly Present' is a series of digital portraits and self-portraits. The series narrates the artist's personal struggles to fit in with her family expectation about her future career and Western life-style.

Picturing myself.

As this image was long planned, the execution of it is cleaner than the rest of my images.

I took a series of 9 images with the help of a tripod and a wired shutter release. The structure of the picture is the same as the first test I did, back before Christmas. This time, instead of using people holding the mirrors, they would be on top of a drawer, with similar colors of the frame of the glasses. The reason to use this drawer was not only to stimulate the location of where the picture was taken, a domestic space.

New Objects.

Drawer: In the second half of the 1930s, the surrealist painter, Salvador Dali paints figurative symbologies of Sigmund Freud concepts. Theories of memory and unconscious were the most explored by Dali. One of those ideologies was that the human body is like a drawer, they express the mystery of the hidden secrets. (below: City of Drawers, Study of the Anthropomorphic Cabinet Collection, 1936)

As my photograph would focus on a subjective feeling and more specifically on the notion of time, the past is always (and will always) be associated with memories. The addition of a drawer seemed a small detail that can unfold this notion.

Flowers and calendar: Other details to recall time are the flowers and the calendar next to one of the mirrors. Flowers are a symbol (in this case) of spring -the calendar is on March-, youngness, and femalehood. The choice of this addition relates to growing and the beginning of a new life (close future, the formation of middle life). While many portraits flowers as womanhood, intimacy, and death, I approach it as the beginning of something new, the first season of life as Vincent Van Gogh did with the Almond Blossom series (1888-1890). (Below: Almond Blossom, 1890).

In my shooting day, I planned on doing 3 different alternatives to choose as the final image. I played with the position of my reflections and the outfits.

Outfits.

Within the first photographs, I tried to portrait a “Venezuelan look”. A folk dress and a stereotypical representation of a Latina.

The traditional costume of Venezuela is pretty and comfy. Venezuelans use light and natural materials as the weather is hot and humid. Historically, Spanish and Caribbean clothing traditions influenced Venezuela.

Venezuelan women use very feminine garments. They traditionally wear long flowing skirts, blouses with one or both off-the-shoulder sleeves (or a similar one-piece dress), a lot of flowers and simple jewelry pieces, to add some Hispanic flavor. The skirts usually are decorated with floral patterns on the fabric. The blouses are often white. Both garments can be embellished with large ruffles. The female folk costume of Venezuela is bright, multicolored, and puffy. The decorations are cheap but elegant and Caribbean-style. They use fresh or artificial flowers to decorate their hair and clothing.

Modern outfits yet are westerns, they hardly ever wear the folkloristic costume, not even on special occasions, such as weddings, national celebrations, and ceremonies. Yet, they are seen in beauty contests like Miss Universe (as seen below).

Internationally, Latin people are represented by the same aesthetic: skin-tight clothes, light skin, red lipstick and nails and straight or wavy dark hair. In the media being Latinx means someone from Mexico, Cuba or Colombia (as presented in the American tv show ‘ Modern Family’ with the actress Sofia Vergara.

“In this representation, the word “spicy” is significantly present, this Latina must be loud, bombastic, seductive and with a heavy accent. She must also be hot-blooded, quick-tempered, and passionate.” - Katherine Garcia, blog writer who points out the struggle of being Latina and identify as one today. (below Sofia Vergara as Gloria, in Modern Family)

For the top shoot, I recreated the folk dress with white sheets, as I couldn’t find any online or for sale. While on the last shoot I used a tight black dress.

Editing, Position, and reading.

I wanted to act out the elements previously listed, and integrate them with the concept of time: the past, the present, and the future. There are three final photographs, as said before, three alternatives. They have been edited in photoshop by simply placing each photograph on top of the others and cleaned my surrounded.

In the first final photograph, the reading is from right to left: The traditional view of Venezuelan (me as past time) on the right, looking at the camera. On the middle image, the round mirror reflects the present, my eyes close as a representation of my blindness of the future. While the left reflection is coming out the round corner, represents the future, looking at the past/present with a more European-style.

In the second final photograph, the reading is from left to right: The past, bigger and with more attitude (hand on the hip) looking at the present, still as in the first photograph. The future instead is a hand (coming out the Present) on top of the camera, visible this time on the right mirror. This methodology is more photogenic, slightly different from the original idea (Kahlo's painting). Yet, the hand creates a more intriguing image.

In the third final photograph, the reading is again from left to right: The past is more distance than in the previous pictures, she is dressed as the stereotypical latina. The rest of the photograph is the same as the second alternative. yet a new addition is the fourth mirror. I thought to go that while a closer future is coming, a more far future is building. On the editing process, I would have edit the reflection of it and add black on it.

After several consultations, and reviews I decided to use the first shot as final. There is balance in the figures and It fits better within the whole series. It’s simply straightforward.

Ghostly Present

First Statement:

The project is an ongoing work of Mery A. David.

Taking a round mirror on herself, the artist uses photography to capture her presence on a daily basis: determining when and where to place her reflection, David takes control of the image and of the space she created memories.

Mixing self-portraiture with street and domestic photography, David aims to investigate her own individual within her surrounded. Exploring thematics of womanhood, distance, loneliness, and relationships roles.

Title

Thinking about a title has been quite difficult as I didn’t want something such as “Here Now”.

So I looked through Feminist poems as my project base is still within feminist thematics.

I found this link, where there are several poems I liked, yet I am unsure if they can represent my whole series.

-”Then there's a pair of us — don't tell!” by Emily Dickison.

- “I am the reflection of my mother and so her mother’s reflection” and “I will be my future, not my past” (excluded as I then found it offensive to all the sacrifices my mother did) by Alyesha Wise and Aman Batra’s "Mom"

-”Shoreline of decision” a line by Audre Lorde, I liked it because I am in the shoreline of a constant decision.

But also songs:

- sweet home, elsewhere.

-Lost in the world (by Bon Iver)

-If we don’t leave this town we might never make it out (from Sleeping on the floor by The Lumineers).

Back at theories of photography, I came across this constant ideology that we capture fleeting moments that act like ghosts. So when it comes to portraiture, people are more worry about being immortalized in a wrong manner. From here several concept and debates whatever or not photography capture the soul of the subject (Ghost In The Shell book about portraiture).

So in this regard, I took Nathaniel Hawthorne quote seen previously in here: “The looking-glass, the polished globes of the andirons, the mirror-like water, and all other reflecting surfaces continually present us with portraits, or rather ghosts, of ourselves which we glance at and straightway forget them. But we forget them only because they vanish. It is the idea of duration -or earthly immortality- that gives such mysterious interest to our portraits”

And so from here, I found “Ghostly Present” to be an adequate name for my project as it reflects on the time, on the absent, and the notion of fleeing portraiture. But also there is a playful in the game as Present and Presence sound very similar, both adjective would work well but also there the struggle of the English language I had overcome in time.

Picturing Friends.

The choice of how to represent friendship in my photograph was taken after shooting in Rochester.

The first idea was to recall impressionist imaginary of women at tea. The Impressionists often included tea in their visual stories, as they present the routine. The sitters were young women, in Bracquemont (from left) painting the three women are in the garden, place where there is a natural light. None of them is looking at the painter, and actually one is giving her back to him, a way impressionist used to represent the high status of their subjects as they are ignoring the lower class (the painter). The young women are completely in a relaxing environment and this was the reason I didn’t take this path; I still wanted something where women are empowered to persuade a career and be friends.

So I moved into looking at artists in their studios, the first artist to pop up was Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner photograph. Yet an image in the studio would stand out from all the images. Another note is that neither Maryia, Mimosa nor I use the studio, and my methodology is to approach reality.

I browsed into self-portraits of women in studio and Élisabeth Lousie Vigée Le Brun and Adélaïde Labille-Guiard. I liked the pose and the domestic sense those paintings portraits, and it shows more thatn one artist in the picture.

I took the photograph in my room. Near the two mirrors that later I will use in the photographs where I am alone. To have a link of the space.

The non-reflection.

Not working with a tripod made the process of taking pictures very stage-like, at the beginning, I just took the photograph when my reflection was in the mirror. Yet, throughout the shoot in London, I caught the shadow or other reflection. By themselves, they might not work but perhaps within all the images produced, their void of self-portraiture add to the symbology of not fitting.

A different attend was to take images of my family night drawer, to have still life in the series.

my grandmother (in Germany)

My brother’s (in Italy)

My mom (in Italy)

Rochester

I also took images back in Rochester, in my house, outside and with friends. As the people I met here are like family.

Picturing My Brother.

Back in England, I shot my closest relative, my brother. He lives in London and since I moved, he full-filled the father role. This is probably not clear in the picture yet the fact that it is the only image with men in it make it outstanding, giving out the fact that they are a couple and that the man standing is a relative, looking at me.

These photographs take me away from the narrowed matriarchal approach and bond me to the genre of family photographs.

For the staged images, I initially looked at photography, to just have a visual idea of how couple relationships have been represented in just one image.

Kim Ok Sun “Happy Together” was a really powerful series, that I really found in contact with my brother situation, as being in a same-sex relationship. Kim Ok Sun created the series to show not only others but also her own experience in interracial relationship; “As it takes a lot of courage for a Korean woman to pursue her love, marry a foreigner and live in Korea, I decided to photograph interracial couples residing in Korea with the Korean woman as the protagonist.” That is why the women of “Happy Together” stare directly at the camera as requested by Kim, while their husbands carry on watching TV or eating supper. I engaged this visual thought, in which my brother is looking at the camera while his husband sees elsewhere.

Soon after, at my visit to the National Gallery, Jan van Eyck poses reminded me of David Hockney painting I saw at the Tate Modern, years back. So I browsed Hockney’s body of work and ‘Mr. and Mrs. Clark and Percy’ made its appearance, it was perfect in poses, with a cat in it (instead of children), the background related to the painting my brother had a home (in where you can see the South American vibes) and there is a table in the scene with flowers, I can place the mirror in.

Mr. and Mrs. Clark and Percy is one of a series of large double portraits which Hockney began in 1968. They are portrayed in their home environment in a style which is both realistic and highly simplified. Hockney worked from photographs and life observation, making drawings to resolve composition. He is depicted Mr. Clark on a chair, his bare feet buried in the long pile of a fur rug. His pose is relaxed but his expression is watchful. Celia stands with one hand on her waist wearing a long, flowing dress and a rather wistful expression. Close to her and therefore, perhaps, associated with her are the lilies, traditionally a symbol of the Annunciation and feminine purity. Likewise, the cat on Ossie’s lap carries symbolic resonances of the libertine and somebody who disregards rules and does as they please. The seventies vibe is heavily present in the object and garments of the sitter.

In the photograph, there is an extra chair on table, symbol that I am there but not with them. You can see the wedding ring on him.

The last image on top was taken during Easter Break to be added at the single domestic photographs.

Arriving home

These are the photographs taken inside the domestic sphere.

I like the dynamic they portraits and the separation between me and the person portraited. They are doing their routines, while I am far and yet close. Yet they are dark images, due to the low lighting in the small, double room, apartment. Because of this and the rejection of tripod on the first place, many images came out blur.

I was able to fix few images; these show mainly my aunt and my grandmother in the house. My mother was hard to take pictures, as she was at work and the pictures taken of her were blurred, out of focus or without the mirror in front.

While taking this images, my concept of focusing on the theme of matriarchy is taken aside. The concept and practice have a weak connection if none. I reflect on what’s this picture means to me really and what I want the audience to get from it. It was not longer a social statement of my family, but about me and how I see myself surrounded by them.

With this turn, I attempted to take pictures of my brother but he refused to be part of my project, he does not like images taken. Until the last night, when he joined the table picture.

I will see if the images get to the final editing, they surely present the notion of the distance that is seen in the landscape images. Perhaps, because of the use of the mirror, is not a narrative about them with me as I initially approached but a depiction of myself and them.

Arriving in Italy

At the end of February, I flew to Italy for three days. The images above are those images taken outside the house and edited down.

I feel these images are very depressing. Also, because of the dark weather in those days.

From left to right: The shot was taken in front of the Duomo, the center cathedral of Milan. In front Christopher Columbus statue. Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, a linked building to the fashion history of the city. My old school, worth taken as it was the first place I felt misplaced. Two images from the streets of Milan. A butcher shop, my grandfather used to be a butcher when I was born. My house door. The Navigli River, a dried water river that is close to my house and that links nightlight with the residencies. On a British train, on my way to Rochester.

One of the troubles I had was the fact that mirror I took along, fell and shattered during after a shot in the market. I looked for a similar one, but there were none small and with a clear frame. I spend a day searching for its replacement. So that say was a waste out of the three.

This images function as diaries; perhaps, they fit better into a book instead of prints, for their dissemination. An option to consider.

Photography and Paintings.

The idea of mimicking paintings in my project came mainly from four sources of inspiration:

-The responses to Frida’s painting and Jeff Wall’s photography, I made in the early stage of my project.

-The four episodes of Way Of Seeing by John Berger, I re-watched after the art critic death in January.

-My passion for history of art

-The help of having images that my sitter can imitate in poses.

Photography and painting have had a fruitful relationship since photography's invention in 1839. Actually, since before that. The precursor of photography, the so-called camera obscura (Latin for "dark chamber"), was invented in 1457 as an aid to drawing. The early argument was about the function of photography and if it belonged to the art world, as an art itself.

“Photography reproduces, it does not produce” and “photography is made not taken” are two sentences that can be taken as the summary of the current types of photography: the reportage and the staged. Within the reportage, there is the documentary and street photography, while in the staged there can be everything that is performed, crafted and edited.

I am currently mixing the performances with the street photography, as placing a mirror in a place is already a form of manipulating the space.

Yet I am planning in create images that recall old master painting.

During my time in Italy, the last night I stayed there, I decided to try and close the curtains of the living room and asked my mom to help me move the table, so the long side of the table was facing the windows.

The choice of recreating Leonardo Da Vinci’s Last Supper then was because of the background of the scene itself and my personal knowledge rather than researchers and then practice. Yet, I believe it’s effective also if seen by the context of my project;

In Matthew 26:24-25, Mark 14:18-21, Luke 22:21-23 and John 13:21-30 during the meal, Jesus predicted that one of his Apostles would betray him. Jesus is described as reiterating, despite each Apostle's assertion that he would not betray Jesus, that the betrayer would be one of those who was present. The Da Vinci’s mural depicts the scene where each apostle is negating it will be one of them to betray Jesus.

My work might not be about being betrayed or have any catholic link to the story, but within the depiction of apostles, in that exact scene -when they are each negating and yet judging who might the future cheater- made it worth keep my photograph in my series. There is a negation of the existence of family expectation and pressures, they all sincerely worry of your well-being, yet if you fail, their fail turn into judgment.

In the photographs, the subjects present different details that can be used to read their personal background. From left to right: My aunt, no ring. My mom, the only one that removed her glasses and posed for the camera. My grandmother, in black showing her rings. My brother, in his teenagehood with a his uncomfortable expression.

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