Weeks after her chat with Gem, Matilde found herself cleaning her film cameras and she was struck by an impulse to make her way to the market and see what inspired her to click the shutter \u2013 when she started, she found she couldn\u2019t stop. From this very first day there was one core tenet that went on to inform the whole project \u2013 not focusing on making \u201cgood\u201d photographs. The camera almost became secondary, or, in Matilde\u2019s words, \u201csuperfluous\u201d, and conversation came first. \u201c[The market is] a perfect place to interact with others without having to excuse yourself for interrupting them,\u201d Matilde says, and if an outfit, tattoo or hairdo caught Matilde\u2019s eye, she ignored the urge to keep the compliment to herself and let the wearer know. \u201cFamiliarity here was key,\u201d she adds, \u201cpeople knowing my face, my name, was essential.\u201d<\/p>\n
Matilde began attending the market regularly, heading along with her family and her partner Mafalda Salgueiro, who was filming to create a short that would accompany the photo series. It made sense that Matilde frequented with those closest to her, as it mimicked the familial, intergenerational dynamics she witnessed and that her lens was so drawn to. The photographer points to a sun-drenched, close-up photo of a little girl sleeping, tucked up amongst blankets and the baby clothes her mother, Solange, sells. \u201cSellers wake up in the wee hours of the morning and eventually everyone needs to take a nap,\u201d Matilde explains. \u201cI love the diptych \u2013 this little world of serenity, motherhood and family in the chaos that is the market.\u201d<\/p>\n
These portraits of sellers and market frequenters are paired with shots of tables laden with denim of all description, nuts, eggs and moments of contrast \u2013 delicate lace hanging from plastic clip hangers, the well-worn back door of a van thrust open, made beautiful by a wash of sunlight. They\u2019re images that Matilde describes feeling as \u201cnatural, unforced, non-hierarchical\u201d, removed from the pressure of being the \u2018perfect\u2019 image to deliver to a client. The ideal conclusion to the project was having it exhibited in Porto, at the Leica Gallery, alongside Mafalda\u2019s accompanying film. Curated by Magda Pinto, the images \u201ctook on a life of their own\u201d and ended up on three-metre-high tarps, trailing the walls of the building. Matilde now has high hopes for the exhibition going on tour. Just like the sellers travelling with their wares, she dreams of taking the \u201ccacophony\u201d of the local Portuguese market to new eyes and ears.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Weeks after her chat with Gem, Matilde found herself cleaning her film cameras and she was struck by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":677735,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[76,354,355,49,48,356,75],"class_list":["post-677734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-design","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/677734","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=677734"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/677734\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/677735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=677734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=677734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=677734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}