Hotel Hoetl by Cristina de Middel
Hotel Hoetl by Cristina de Middel
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About this series
”Cristina de Middel investigates photography’s ambiguous relationship to truth,” states Magnum photos. She uses reconstructions and archetypes to build a more layered understanding of the subjects she approaches, blending documentary and conceptual photographic practices.
The Hotel Hoetl series, created during the residency of Cristina de Middel, is a tale of the place which became the central point of urban wandering in wintery Łódź:, the hotel where the artist was staying. The short series makes use of the above mentioned blending of documentary and conceptual photography.
The otherworldly looking photographs depict each a story of its own. De Middel takes us to the world of horror films, fairy tales and unexplained phenomena, inviting the people she met during her stay to take part in her play, in which she toys with numerous pop cultural references and with her own imaginings, triggered by the ambience of the place.
Artist Bio
1975 born Cristina de Middel is a Spanish documentary photographer and artist living and working in Uruapan, Mexico. Her impulse for an unconventional angle developed after a 10-year career as a photojournalist when De Middel stepped outside of straight documentary and self-published the acclaimed series The Afronauts (2012). It explored the history of a failed space program in Zambia in the 1960s through staged reenactments of obscure narratives, challenging the traditional depiction of the African continent. The book quickly sold out and the work was met with critical acclaim. She was nominated for the 2013 Deutsche Börse Photography Prize for The Afronauts. In 2013, de Middel received the Infinity Award from the International Center of Photography and in 2017 she became a nominee member of Magnum Photos top become a full membber in 2022.
Photographer: Cristina de Middel
Twitter: @cristinaDmiddel
Instagram: @lademiddel
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Photos copyright Cristina de Middel
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