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Isabel Muñoz: "Fish also suck camera"

2021-05-31T14:45:22.814Z


The photographer, winner of the National Award, dives into the tanks of the Oceanogràfic de Valencia to portray the freediver Ai Futaki and denounce the contamination in a PhotoEspaña exhibition


Isabel Muñoz meditates by immersing herself in the water.

The feeling of weightlessness and silence seem to stop time.

"It is my way of meditating, a very pleasant but also dangerous feeling," says the 70-year-old photographer from Barcelona.

It is also his way of working in recent times.

Dive to capture the beauty of the seabed, the encounter of the human body with underwater fauna, and to denounce the invasion of plastics and the pollution of the seas.

The National Photography Prize has made water the reason for his art and life, as evidenced by the new installation that is presented this Monday at the Lázaro Galdiano Museum in Madrid, within the PhotoEspaña program.

It is titled

We are water.

More information

  • The sublime underwater beauty in seven photographs

  • We are water: the beauty of dwindling icebergs

During the pandemic, Muñoz immersed himself in the tanks of the Oceanogràfic de Valencia to capture the coexistence of human beings with fish, jellyfish, rays ... He did it in the company of an exceptional diver, the freediver and also photographer Ai Futaki, holder of two Guinness records when traveling with a single breath of air, without a cylinder, 100 meters with fins and 90 without them.

“I always get in the water, in the sea, in the tanks. It is the way to get closer to nature, to bridge the distance that exists with the human being. When I did the primates series, I needed to touch them; I also got into the freezing water for pictures of the icebergs. I have discovered nature that way. And I have to say that fish have much more knowledge than what is usually said and than we think. They recognize you. There were three fish that, as soon as they saw me, they burst my plane. It amused them. Fish also suck camera. When you analyze the videos, you realize that they are looking at the camera, it seems that they have a conscience and I think they do, ”the artist, winner of two World Press Photo, explains by phone.

Image by Isabel Muñoz, taken at the Oceanogràfic, which is part of the 'We are water' project.ISABEL MUNOZ / ISABEL MUÑOZ

These images are part of a new project on water commissioned by the PhotoEspaña and Acciona organization, which has been captured in an interactive exhibition, with several video screens.

“It has been a magical project, because it came out despite all the difficulties caused by the pandemic.

Ai could not enter Spain.

Help was obtained from Casa del Mediterráneo [where an exhibition with its new images will be inaugurated on June 8] and we have the collaboration of the Oceanogràfic, which brings together a sample of the seas of the planet and is a jewel, for its dedicated workers in body and soul to the sea and for its project of transmitting to young people the love for the marine world and the need to take care of it, ”says Muñoz.

"We plan to make a piece full of hope because I believe that we still have time to stop climate change and preserve water as a principle and a right of human beings," says the photographer, who began diving on a commission from EL COUNTRY when he made a photographic report of water polo players and swimmers synchronized who were to compete for Spain at the Olympics in Sydney 2000. "we will show also the

making of

of the project, large photographs of platafina, as they made the old daguerreotypes, and three giant screens, two on the sides and a central one that will allow each visitor to have a different experience depending on the movement ”.

Ai Futaki seems to caress a jellyfish in the Oceanogràfic tank.isabel munoz

The fascination for marine fauna and deep sea beds has not eclipsed her interest in the human body, which has characterized most of her career as a photographer.

In fact, he is also very present in his latest projects through the participation of Futaki, and other divers from the Valencian aquarium, the largest in Europe.

“Ai has a magical way of interacting with the water and with the fish that inhabit it.

The fish themselves take it for one more.

She looks like a dancer creating a choreography with the fish.

And with the jellyfish there were magical moments.

He got into one, touched them, with the prevention that we all have that it bites you ”, the artist details.

Belugas and turtles

Muñoz already has other underwater projects in mind, such as portraying belugas in the open sea, registering the release of turtles or denouncing the problem of the disappearance of posidonia on the Alicante island of Tabarca.

It also has Futaki for some of them.

The Japanese diver is an ambassador for the environment of her country and shares vital and artistic concerns with the Spanish photographer, turned into an activist of the oceans and convinced of the common goal of leaving a better world for future generations.

Isabel Muñoz takes photos in the Oceans tank where the sharks of the Oceanogràfic of Valencia are

A very complicated task in light of the worrying data that does not stop on the waste of the consumer society. “So far in the 21st century we have already consumed more plastic in the world than in the entire 20th century. We are more people and we throw more and more things. The bottom of the sea is fascinating and unknown; Trying to decipher that mystery is worth it. But for that we must change what is happening, stop the destruction and pollution. For that we have to take care of the water because we are all water ”, he concludes.

Source: elparis

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