Towards the English Channel

The subject of my photo study is the relationship between men and the environment, more particularly with water, and the sensory and even emotional changes that this relation can bring about.  I seek to unveil the imagery experienced by those who participate in this symbiosis.  I intend to transpose the viewer to that moment pictured in the photograph, sometimes in a realistic way and at times by means of cloudy images, as the vision of someone who is underwater with no goggles or mask.

Tiago Sato, the subject of this photo essay, was born in the Brazilian cerrado, where it is still possible to find people who have never seen the sea. Born in Brasilia, Tiago has turned the Paranoá Lake into his beach and it has been a year since he started this daring journey, planning to cross the 32 km that separate the cities of Dover, in England, and Calais, in the North of France.  To a resolute athlete, the challenge starts way before the crossings ground zero. It is necessary to train for years in order to accomplish this feat in about 10 hours.  This daily training routine becomes part of the athletes life in such an intense way that it is like the act of breathing.

The mixture of a primitive challenge in swimming across the distance from an island to the continent and the human contact with, and respect to, the environment constitute the scope of this photo essay.

foto por Arthur Monteiro

BIO

Brasileiro, nascido em Niterói, Rio de Janeiro (1970). Formei-me em Desenho Industrial em 1994. Morando em Brasília desde 1995, meus projetos atuais abordam as nossas mudanças e reações quando em contato com a água, os Cultos Religiosos Afrodescendentes e a cidade de Brasília.

Como amador no real sentido do termo, que se dedica a uma arte por amor, procuro na fotografia uma forma de expressão estética, social e autoral, registrando a minha visão sobre determinado momento.

Mineral Water

The human beings relation’s with the water has become more and more fundamental. Years ago nobody thought about what could happen if the water vanishes of the planet. Now people are fighting by changes.

Far from Brazil’s coast, in Brasília, place where the drought hurts the land and the air during five months by year, there is a river basin which supplies the citizens of the city. Their fountains, into Brasília National Park, also provide two swimming pools with clean mineral water. The bathers, perhaps, don’t pay attention for this big privilege and how it is intense.
The submersion may be a solitary action like a dive in yourself. The time and sounds are able to change the way they feel the world. The sun heats their skin for a cold dive followed by the sound of bubbling near of their ears and by fresh wind when they leave the pool.
The intent of this essay is to capture the sensations promoted by the contact with this environment.