She Looks into Me
(2015 - 2018)
“She looks into me” tells a story of innocence and perversion. It's a series of intimate images that hold a deep reverence for a time when the mystery of life and death were closely related.
Conceived in a manner close to theater, the book is divided into three chapters (Being, Becoming, Unbecoming) that explore the idea of human representation and how looking at an image actively (and preferably slowly) can evoke more than what is actually depicted in front of one's eye. To look at something is undeniably very different from looking into something and this marks the genesis for this work that borrows the title from a poem by Surrealist poet Paul Éluard.
From a necessity of simplification of form/content the author takes the reader in a stream of consciousness relation between each picture choreographed to address a sphere of the immaterial and through subtle and evocative nuances talk about symbolic aspects of the human psyche and how we all relate at some point in our lives.
Order book here
Conceived in a manner close to theater, the book is divided into three chapters (Being, Becoming, Unbecoming) that explore the idea of human representation and how looking at an image actively (and preferably slowly) can evoke more than what is actually depicted in front of one's eye. To look at something is undeniably very different from looking into something and this marks the genesis for this work that borrows the title from a poem by Surrealist poet Paul Éluard.
From a necessity of simplification of form/content the author takes the reader in a stream of consciousness relation between each picture choreographed to address a sphere of the immaterial and through subtle and evocative nuances talk about symbolic aspects of the human psyche and how we all relate at some point in our lives.
Order book here
Exhibitions / Presentations
2019/2020 - Centro Cultural de Cascais - Cascais, Portugal
2019 - Museu Municipal de Faro - Faro, Portugal
2018 - Feira do Livro de Lisboa - Lisbon, Portugal
Shortlisted for the “Best Book Design From All Over the World” competition of Stiftung Buchkunst, in Leipzig
Shortlisted on the 2018 list of “Interesting Artist and Photographic Books for 2018”, according with The Photobook Journal
Book Reviews
“(...) The gaze of the other can change everything, it can appease, nurture, but there are always moments when the dialogue is just ours. Facing a camera is like that as well, in a process of recognition, construction and (de)construction – being, becoming, unbecoming. The photograph as an object is the crystallization of that moment and the starting point for a journey continuously rich in revelations about our identity.
Somehow, that is the cornerstone process of Nuno Moreira’s brand-new book, She Looks into Me. Through a dance between the shadows and the body, there is a three-chapter exploration (Being, Becoming, Unbecoming) on the greatest mystery of the collective and individual identity – the cycles of life and death. Symbolic aspects, representative of how we relate to each other, are entangled in the simplification of the body forms and in the fluctuations of gestures and shadows.(...)”
Filipa Penteado (click for full article)
"In his previous work Nuno sought to «capture» his moments of unconsciousness, whereas in the realization of She Looks into Me, he appropriated the unconscious to strive to represent it, and his work is now much closer to that of the Surrealists.Life, death, dreams, thoughts, are the raw material. The threads are woven into a play. The pictures are always aesthetic, but it is to make us forget their presence and allow us to focus on the narration which remains interpreted by everyone’s mind. It draws, one chapter after the other, the «being», the «becoming» and the process of deconstruction that follows («unbecoming»).Consistency remains throughout the book, with recurring patterns that allow us to read a continuum, such as the cycle of life and death, which are, of course, ubiquitous motifs throughout the book. The rhythms change, accelerate and then slow down, before accelerating again. In this book, all the formal elements that constitute it (photos, layout, texts...) disappear at the service of the storytelling.
Christer Ek (click for full article)
“(...) Estamos ante un fotolibro que pese a ser presentado por un poema, ya es un poema en sí. Es un libro lleno de imágenes lentas, imágenes que se mueven despacio dentro de sí mismas y entre y unas otras. Imágenes, también, elegantes, profundas y dramáticas. Las fotografías alcanzan nuestra mente y nuestro corazón. Lo atraviesan y lo palpan. Lo acarician y lo velan. Eso es lo que la mirada de Moreira hace, como la flecha de Cupido o la lanza de un guerrero. El gesto aquí se torna principal, nos lleva a lo que Nuno quiere transmitir: corporeidad, miradas, inconsciencia. Luz que ensombrece pero que ilumina lo que vemos. Estamos, sin duda, ante un fotolibro que no hay que dejar escapar. Un fotolibro que habla por sí solo, como deberían hacer todos. Lleno de psicología humana, tan profunda como sutil, tan bella como oscura. Si tenemos en cuenta de que cada proyecto artístico nos habla de la vida interior del autor, descubriremos un alma llena de amor por la belleza y por lo misterioso; algo que, sin necesidad de decir nada más, ya queremos tener con nosotros.(...)” Francisca Pageo (click for full article)
“(...) Relationships and all that they engender – genesis, growth, possibly also decline, and the specter of cessation – are ever-present themes in this book, which provides both visual depth and tactile pleasure. This is a volume that can have a strong effect on the viewer: it is a journey to the interior via the exterior. An important work of fine art photography that engages the viewer/reader in a variety of ways – visually, textually, and viscerally.
Gerhard Clausing (click for full article)