1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Life is what we make of it. Travel is the traveler. What we see isn’t what we see but what we are.
- Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet
At the year’s end of 2019, I traveled to a residency in Southern Portugal in hopes of photographing a working copper mine first established before the Roman Empire. Naively, I believed I could gain access to the mining operation despite arriving during the holiday season. Thwarted in my intent and camera in hand, I walked and photographed the streets and borderlines of the town of Messejana, whose occupants worked the mines for centuries. The walls encircling and defining the small mining town were adorned and personalized with Moorish-inspired tiles, colors, and patterns that changed with the width of every adjoining house. Each section was individually unique but also interchangeable. The facade appeared to me as a collective patchwork in a constant state of flux between decay and renewal. Messejana’s panoramic view, as captured in the adjacent walls, ultimately measured and controlled the distance between me--the cultural tourist and the local inhabitants. My limited access only bolstered my contemplative musings.
Many months after returning home, I discovered the name Messejana has its origin in the Arabic word “masjana,” which refers to prison or jail, a word derived from the verb “Sanjana,” which means to incarcerate or imprison. Whether initially referencing a long ago architectural structure or a conquest of territory, Messejana’s name resonated with my current isolation. The series would never have come together without the strange seclusion and concentration of time darkly afforded amid a raging pandemic.
Alan Labb, June 2021
In the Distance #6, 2021
48 x 16 inches, archival pigment ink print mounted on Dibond
In The Distance #7, 2021
48 x 16 inches, archival pigment ink print mounted on Dibond
In the Distance #3, 2021
48 x 16 inches, archival pigment ink print mounted on Dibond
In the Distance #2, 2021
48 x 16 inches, archival pigment ink print mounted on Dibond
In the Distance #4 (Visit to Aljustrel), 2021
48 x 16 inches, archival pigment ink print mounted on Dibond
In The Distance #5 (Arena de Touros), 2021
72 x 16 inches, archival pigment ink print mounted on Dibond
In the Distance #8, 2021
72 x 16 inches, archival pigment ink print mounted on Dibond
In the Distance #9, 2021
48 x 16 inches, archival pigment ink print mounted on Dibond