© Stephanie Gengotti
The project Enguera was born from the encounter between the photographer Stephanie Gengotti and the Spanish artistic duo ‘Las Mitocondria’. Alicia Herrero and María Ángeles Vila have been engaged in developing research projects about women's traditional gender roles for the past decade.
Enguera is a place, a root, a world. The reflection on the feminine world does not fold into closed and reserved spaces but also chooses openness. The sorority and family memories leave the internal membrane to move towards the outside, the social environment.
Thus the images lead us into territory made up of a continuous alternation of everyday life and formalities, sisterhood and intimacy, nature and religion... where it is necessary to find a center of gravity in the inevitable succession and intertwining of female support through generations. The scenic reconstruction of memories becomes an occasion for the present time. Memories become a possibility for reflection and re-appropriation.
Enguera is an ongoing project like the women who animate it.
Text by Pamela Piscicelli
click a link to view the complete set of images in the archive
Footnote: These are staged images regarding a universal vision of the woman and the strong bond of a sorority. The artistic duo ‘Las Mitocondria’ has provided, ancient clothes belonging to the woman of their families and collected over many years. Enguera is the name of the Spanish village it was shot in. It was a collaboration between women artists exploring the feminine world of the sacred, rituals, religion, family, the special bond between women of different generations, and finally the natural and spiritual world.
