[Carte Blanche Students] Discover the 20 finalists of the Carte Blanche Students 2022 ! Almudena Almudena is the body of a virtual, anonymous and common identity. An image conceived by artificial intelligence from an archive found in a cemetery. Almudena: the archive. Our Lady of Almudena, in Madrid, is one of the largest and oldest cemeteries in Europe, a place where more than five million people are buried. "For years I have been visiting this cemetery on a regular basis. In my drifts between their tombstones I began to notice the photographic portraits present in many of them. Attracted by their forms and their plastic qualities, I started to record and accumulate them to create a photographic archive." These portraits, inscribed on the tombs with the desire for the imperishable memory of the photographic document, evidence our existence in the form of a direct trace. Its continuous and irreversible deterioration certifies the certainty of death, both for physical bodies and for the objectivity attributed to the photographic medium itself. 

"Far from devaluing the photographic document, I find that these photographs, eroded by the passage of time, enhance it. By allowing us to access new layers of anonymous matter and a more subtle and intangible form of what we call truth." Almudena: an identity.

« Interested in the expressive and artistic possibilities of technological media, as well as surprised by the performative and transformative capacities of the image generated by artificial intelligence, I began a research process around these algorithms capable of learning and creating.
 
To do this, I created a new experience from the expansion and addition of appropriate and accumulated identities. Resignifying the photographic archive as a database to feed an artificial intelligence algorithm, trained to conceive Almudena: the body of a virtual, anonymous and common identity." Image from the series "Almudena" by JAVIER TALAVERA @javier.talavera_ Link in bio to discover the projects of the 20 finalists! - In partnership with @gares_connexions & @pictofr #parisphotofair #carteblanchestudents #carteblanche2021 #emergingphotography