The Gabriel project is a visual portrait of Gabriel’s transition over six years. The photographs of his physical transition are surrounded by landscapes that have witnessed his changes and revelation, and include phrases taken from his diaries and interviews with Gabriel himself that help to understand the evolution of his feelings. The project also includes archive images of his childhood, when he still responded to the name of Isabel, and includes selfies that the protagonist has shared in his social networks from 2012 to 2018, the key years of his journey.
Mar Sáez (Murcia, 1983) combines her work as a freelance photographer with the development of personal projects with which she tries to explore the complexity of identity and biopolitics, trying to make a portrait, from within, of the realities that concern her.
She has won the LUX Prize twice for Professional Photography in the Documentary category. She has also participated, since 2008, in various solo and group exhibitions in Europe, Asia and the United States and at fairs like Paris Photo, ARCO, Estampa o London Art Fair. In October 2016 she published her photobook Vera y Victoria and in 2019 Gabriel, both with the French publisher André Frère Éditions and presented in Paris Photo.
She also published the newspaper DÚO-A Sobre el viaje por carretera con desconocidos (About the road trip with strangers) (edited by Phree), together with the writer Miguel Ángel Hernández. In 2018 her works have been exhibited in Barcelona (Can Basté), Madrid (Feria Estampa y Pilar Serra’s Gallery), Baracaldo (Festival Baffest), Arles (Feria Cosmos), Vitoria (Sala Amárica), Alcobendas' Art Center and Marseille (Galería Retine Argentique), among others, and in 2019-2020, in Tigomigo Gallery (Terrassa, Barcelona), F22 Foto Space (Hong Kong), KLAP Maison pour la Danse (Marsella), the London Art Fair and Desenfocada Gallery (Málaga). As an artist, Sáez is represented by the Pilar Serra Gallery in Madrid, the Fifty Dots Gallery in Barcelona and the Institute Agency in Los Angeles.
Vera y Victoria
Vera confessed to Victoria that she was transexual the day they kissed for the first time. It was in a park. It did not change anything. For the four years that they were together, they loved each other as they had never loved anyone before. For that part of their lives, Vera and Victoria were no longer two people, they merged into one. They built a home together filled with dreams and future projects.
The project is a visual diary shot between 2012 and 2016 in which I have portrayed the intimate universe of Vera and Victoria. A universe in which new facets of a relationship as intense as theirs come to the surface. No better or worse than
anyone else.
A Los Que Viajan (To The Travellers)
Some years ago I moved to Madrid to live. Some years inundated with conflicting feelings. Feeling like I was from here, but also from there. Almost always feeling like I was from nowhere. Years in which travelling became a lifestyle. A period in which I have formed memories made up of portraits of complex individuals and lost gazes. Strangers that I have shared dead time with waiting and travelling between cities, “the moments in which one ceases to be”, as my dear friend Miguel Ángel Hernández.
At some point during the conversations I had with my travelling companions they shared their experiences with me and talked to me about their feelings and worries. I then understood that the things that sometimes seem unique, individual and personal to us perhaps are not. That we have more experiences and fears in common with others than we imagine. That we live in a permanent area of uncertainty. After becoming aware of this situation, this piece of work has become a small dedication to “those that travel” and, above all, “to those that feel”.