Mayte Breed

The translucent foil covering the window is what separates us from seeing each other. I stand there for fifteen minutes or so, watching the person on the other side cover the glass with tape in a gentle motion. When they press the tape, I can notice some contours, but when they move away, they fade back into their grey surroundings. Patiently, I wait for the person to finish framing the window. I am not sure if they saw me, but it was an intimate moment in time. A small occurrence that requires a conscious witness.

In I See a Melting Window, photographs and moving images are combined into a dialogue. Trained as a biologist, I consciously and precisely examine my surroundings through the photographic medium. Small encounters become part of a larger ecosystem of images, allowing an interplay of associations to form.

Flattened into two dimensions, I analyze the relationship between humans and their environment, invisible biological processes, and the element of time. Delicate forms are reproduced, reinterpreted, and reconsidered, like the cracks in a butterfly’s wings or melting star-shaped icecubes in a glass. Each image becomes a window into a new reality. In a universe of daydreams and routines, built upon fast- paced efficiency, I attentively watch slices oF life unfold.