To Comb the Time (Traces - 03/2026)

Andrea and Gabriel suggested we work with an emotion, and so I chose pain, specifically the generational pain of the women in my life, as an ode to those who came before me and those who come after me.

Through an action on the beach, captured in 36 images in an ordered sequence, working in the sand with my hands, I recall time, which proved to be a purifying and healing experience for me.

The texts I wrote automatically at the beginning of the seminar serve as dialogues.

Pain / Love. A feeling that blends the voluntary and the imposed, born from my recent care for my mother, rekindling scenes between her and my grandmother, scenes that are repeated today between my mother and me. It is also a longing for my childhood, a sorrow for past losses and those yet to come. The games of my childhood, the adventure of tangling my hands among the clothes my grandmother left soaking in the icy water of the washbasin outside my grandparents' house, where she washed with such energy… Or combing my mother's hair while she sewed or knitted marvels, yesterday a pleasurable game, today a necessity due to her convalescent dependency. Combing time has been like washing my gaze as my grandmother washed clothes. Cleaning the tangles, the murky. Recalling memories. Observing life, aware of its recurring cycle. Like the tides, events repeat themselves. Lives are mourned because they don't return. Watching the end of what you love most approach, and accepting its inevitable passage, preserving and dusting off what is beautiful.

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My Grandmother Washes the Clothes (Video)