Three years ago, Jorge Perez Ortiz was on a small wooden boat travelling from Cartagena in Colombia to a group of nearby islands when the sea became unexpectedly rough. As a strong wave hit, Ortiz, sitting at the bow, felt his body lift and come down sharply on his seat. The sudden impact fractured a vertebra. He was taken to hospital and underwent emergency surgery.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve always been captivated by the power of water and the sense of freedom and escape one feels when diving into it,\u201d Ortiz says, \u201cbut until that point, I\u2019d never considered the other side of this freedom and the risks it carries.\u201d<\/p>\n
When he was back home in Barcelona, the accident and recovery inspired a new photographic series, The Swimmers<\/a>, now a\u00a0book<\/a> (Alep Publishing). \u201cWhat happened sparked a newfound appreciation for life and for the resilience of the body,\u201d he says. \u201cWith the support of a coach, I\u00a0began swimming, and I felt compelled to document this world with my camera.\u201d<\/p>\n Ortiz shot the series on medium format film, but would occasionally use his iPhone 16 Pro Max to assist him in setting up. This image was shot on his phone at a pool used in Barcelona\u2019s 1992 Olympic Games; the city\u2019s cathedral and the Torre Gl\u00f2ries skyscraper are visible in the background. The swimmers are from two of the city\u2019s teams, Sabadell and Mediterranean. Ortiz told them where to stand\u00a0but adds that their poses were not directed.<\/p>\n \u201cI was really surprised by the confidence they showed in front of the camera and the powerful energy they transmitted,\u201d he adds. \u201cThis project is a\u00a0tribute to hard work and unwavering dedication.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Three years ago, Jorge Perez Ortiz was on a small wooden boat travelling from Cartagena in Colombia to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":260988,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[442,498,499,500,501,156,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-260987","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-arts-and-design","10":"tag-artsanddesign","11":"tag-artsdesign","12":"tag-design","13":"tag-entertainment","14":"tag-new-zealand","15":"tag-newzealand","16":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260987"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260987\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/260988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}