A Cloak of Sadness

In the 1980s, while attending canto nuevo concerts at the University Parish, I first heard Valparaíso by Gitano Rodríguez, performed by Aquelarre. The sadness, nostalgia, and melancholy that ran through the song left a deep mark on me, later intensified when I listened to the author’s original version.

Years later, already a photographer and a frequent visitor to Valparaíso, I felt the need to register what the place stirred in my senses and emotions. Opposed to the habitual gaze of the port—directed toward the vastness of the sea—I propose another: a gaze turned toward the hills, their streets, and their houses.

This series engages in dialogue with the image of the mantle of sadness described by Gitano Rodríguez, transforming it into a space for visual reflection. Through a precise selection of locations, light, and chromatic transformation, the photographs seek to intensify this emotional experience.

The invitation is to contemplate these images as an intimate pause. In a culture that tends to reject sadness, this work proposes it as a necessary territory: a space for deep connection with oneself, for relationship, and for poetry.