El observatorio [The Observatory] (2012)
Digital print on paper
100 x 120 cm
BA Collection
Inventory No.: 2012.231.1
El Observatorio [The Observatory] is part of the project of the same name that Elssie Ansareo produced in 2012. The artist reflects between the scene and the viewer, with theatrical images with which she seeks to unsettle the audience.
This photography project focuses on portraying bodies under stress, depicting terms related to hysteria, the outcome of a conversation she had with the psychologist Imanol Amayra. The artist has photographed a series of men with the same gesture – what is known as the arch of hysteria –, foreshortened, as if a shiver was running through the model’s body. They are illogical poses, which shift between large movements and contortions, in order to depict the pain of the individual. The archive draws upon texts and images gathered in many different ways; even including the material that the protagonists themselves have decided to share.