Retratos

A portrait is not a flattering biography or a magazine profile. Here a person is examined the way a symptom is examined, not out of curiosity about their private life but because their trajectory reveals how a structure of power actually works. The private only matters when it explains the institutional.

We choose who to portray by function, not by fame. A minor official with access to important decisions interests us more than a celebrity with no real influence, because power is rarely exercised where the camera is pointing. The individual is the entry point, the structure is the subject.

Some of the people we portrayed never answered our questions. That too is information, because silence in the face of specific questions about specific decisions often says as much as a full answer, sometimes more. Every attempt at contact is noted in the final text, not as a reproach but as part of the method, so the reader knows exactly what was asked and what was left unanswered.