3rd place
bronze star award
ANA LEAL
brazil
title
Psychological Landscapes
It all starts with a photograph of a landscape. A lake, a river, a mountain. Scenarios that are so common to our eyes. All the images were captured in Yellowstone National Park and Grand Teton National Park, both in the USA.
From a single image, I start working on a digital process aiming to transform the usual landscape photograph into a psychological landscape that represents our feelings and moods. Each piece of work has its name in reference to these sensations such as Blurry Calm, Blurry Joy, Blurry Serene…
The work also pays homage to the abstraction exercises of the Dutch artist Theo van Doesburg, the main leader of the De Stijl movement. The work assumes digital manipulation in contemporary photography to present it as a support for artistic expression, and not as a means of capturing records.
Although they are simply photographs, they are also pure paintings, brushstrokes made through a lens, dubious colors and abstract shapes, vestiges of landscapes, which invite us to dive into their inner labyrinths.
Leal is a Gold Award winner on the 2020 Tokyo International Foto Awards and the 15th Julia Margaret Cameron Award Winner both in the abstract category. She also received an Honorable Mention on Prix de La Photographie Paris and on the 15th Pollux Awards as on Latin America 7.Her work has been exhibited across the United States and Brazil. She was nominated “Artist of the Future "by Contemporary Art Curator Magazine in 2020 and has been published at Envision Arts Magazine, Thought art Magazine, and Dodho Magazine.
Leal (b. 1969) currently works and lives in São Paulo, Brazil. She completed her MFA at Miami International University of Arts and Design (2018).
back to gallery
entry description
“Psychological landscapes” aim to show new possibilities for the viewer to observe the world.It all starts with a photograph of a landscape. A lake, a river, a mountain. Scenarios that are so common to our eyes. All the images were captured in Yellowstone National Park and Grand Teton National Park, both in the USA.
From a single image, I start working on a digital process aiming to transform the usual landscape photograph into a psychological landscape that represents our feelings and moods. Each piece of work has its name in reference to these sensations such as Blurry Calm, Blurry Joy, Blurry Serene…
The work also pays homage to the abstraction exercises of the Dutch artist Theo van Doesburg, the main leader of the De Stijl movement. The work assumes digital manipulation in contemporary photography to present it as a support for artistic expression, and not as a means of capturing records.
Although they are simply photographs, they are also pure paintings, brushstrokes made through a lens, dubious colors and abstract shapes, vestiges of landscapes, which invite us to dive into their inner labyrinths.
about the photographer
Brazilian photographer Ana Leal born in Northeast Brazil is an artist who works primarily in photography. She considers photography to be a tool for both depicting and escaping from reality and explores these possibilities through ideas surrounding memory, the passage of time, and empty spaces. She is inspired by Minimalism and the Concretism movement in Brazil, as well as Impressionist painters. Through simple images, abstractions, and photographic collages, she aims to share the beauty of simplicity by depicting natural environments and everyday life, focusing on minutiae, like the details and the sensation of these environments, capturing their fragility and fugacity. Her editing process consists of pairing down photographs to depict stillness and structure and often exhibits her works as diptychs or triptychs printed on various media, such as paper, canvas, and aluminum. In support of a contemplative lifestyle, her hope is to offer introspective space for the viewers through the work.Leal is a Gold Award winner on the 2020 Tokyo International Foto Awards and the 15th Julia Margaret Cameron Award Winner both in the abstract category. She also received an Honorable Mention on Prix de La Photographie Paris and on the 15th Pollux Awards as on Latin America 7.Her work has been exhibited across the United States and Brazil. She was nominated “Artist of the Future "by Contemporary Art Curator Magazine in 2020 and has been published at Envision Arts Magazine, Thought art Magazine, and Dodho Magazine.
Leal (b. 1969) currently works and lives in São Paulo, Brazil. She completed her MFA at Miami International University of Arts and Design (2018).
back to gallery