CHILDREN SHOULD BE HOLDING MOM'S HAND
Digital photography
2011
100 x 66 cm
Installation of 6 photographs printed on Hahnemühle 100% cotton paper
Edition four copies + one artist's proof
I lived for a year sharing an apartment with a journalist who worked at the time for the newspaper elPeriódico. While he was doing research on Roosevelt Hospital, he told me about its impoverished state, having had access to the childcare area, where he could see several abused children and, especially, the case he shared with me of a six-year-old boy infected with syphilis due to sexual abuse of his own father. This and several other tragic stories made me reflect on the idea of "family", but reversing traditional roles and showing how it looks when the family instead of protecting and caring for their children does the opposite. These images are strong and marked by the memories of those stories, so I chose a horror B-movie look: Dehumanized masks, with children who look like rag dolls in absurd or simply contemplative situations, but which provoke a palpable sense of discomfort and confusion to the viewer.
