Álvaro Laiz | Artista multidisciplinar y fotógrafo documental

The hunter explores the Udege belief in Amba, the spirit of the Amur tiger, through a fateful 1997 encounter between a poacher and a tiger seeking vengeance. This narrative of strategy, instinct, and retribution illustrates the Udege’s animistic worldview, where nature’s forces demand respect. Set in the boreal forests of the Russian Far East, The Hunter reflects on shamanistic traditions and the profound connection between the Udege people and their environment. Supported by Fundación Cerezales and Magnum Foundation.

The edge traces humanity’s ancient migration across the Bering Strait during the last Ice Age, a time when Siberian hunters traversed the shifting landscape of Kromka, the bridge between Asia and America. Integrating evolutionary biology and visual art, the project unveils our shared heritage of migration and memory. Spanning from the Bering Strait to Tierra del Fuego, The edge bridges traditional cosmogonies and genetic research to reflect on identity and our profound connection to land.

Winter´s Memoriy delves into the dehesa, an ecosystem that defies binaries, thriving in the liminal space between wild and domesticated. Álvaro Laiz examines symbiosis as a force that reshapes biological, cultural, and spiritual evolution, inspired by Lynn Margulis’s vision of humans as “walking communities.” Through his work, Laiz invites viewers to question the boundaries of nature and humanity, fostering a dialogue between earthly and sacred, human and non-human intelligences, and exploring continuities across time.

Winter´s Memory is a commissioned project by Fundación Campocerrado as part of its I artistic production residency grant.

Wonderland captures the resilient cultural identity of the Warao people in Venezuela’s Amacuro Delta, where traditions have endured despite colonial pressures. Central to this project is the recognition of Tida Wena, individuals who transcend traditional gender categories, echoing the “two-spirit” roles once respected across Indigenous societies. These pre-Columbian beliefs, now endangered by acculturation, may be among the last expressions of an ancient understanding of gender, documented here for the first time.

Transmongolian, the secret history of the mongols, explores the complex legacy of Mongolia’s The secret history of the mongols, which chronicles the rise of Genghis Khan and reveals a cultural backdrop where shamanism intersected with social norms. Eight centuries later, homosexuality remains taboo, with LGBTQ+ individuals facing repression and seeking refuge abroad for acceptance and identity. Through this lens, Transmongolian reflects on tradition, modernity, and the persistent struggles of Mongolia’s marginalized communities.

Atlantes delves into the perilous lives of Galician fishermen along Spain’s Coast of Death, a rugged landscape marked by shipwrecks and fierce Atlantic waves. For centuries, economic hardship has driven locals to risk their lives harvesting percebes—a delicacy thriving where sea and wind are most violent. Through visceral imagery, Atlantes captures the fishermen’s daily encounters with danger, underscoring the enduring human bond with the ocean and the sacrifices woven into this tradition.

Fosil explores the decline of coal mining in northern Spain, a once-thriving industry now facing extinction. Through an archaeological lens, the project documents fossilized Carboniferous remains, the miners’ lives, and their tools, now relics of a vanishing culture. Fosil juxtaposes the economic shift rendering mining unviable with the enduring cultural legacy embedded in this landscape, aiming to preserve a way of life on the brink of oblivion.
Fosil is a commissioned project by Museo Arte Contemporáneo de Castilla y León (MUSAC).

I was never really there examines memory as a shifting, virtual theater, where childhood recollections reside between past and present, reality and imagination. Through an introspective journey, the artist navigates the hidden connections between his 1984 self and his 2022 self. Created for Obscura’s The world today, this NFT project draws inspiration from Edward Steichen’s The family of man, using blockchain to archive global imagery and redefine photographic boundaries in the web3 era.

Our memory functions in a remarkable way, akin to a virtual theater. Many of my childhood memories appear as negative images, underdeveloped and waiting to be processed. Others reside in an intermediary space, existing halfway between the present and the past, reality and imagination. I recall my childhood and adolescence as a perplexing stage in which I perpetually felt like an outsider. Books, comics, movies, and video games served as my escape from a world where I didn’t quite fit in. Through these mediums, I connected with unfamiliar realms. Donning a helmet and clutching a book, I played the role of a time traveler, projecting myself into the future.

I was never really there initiates a dialogue that explores the concealed connections between distant and seemingly contrasting versions of myself, spanning both the past and the present. It’s akin to a trading card game played between the child I was in 1984 and the ever-evolving individual I’ve become in the present day—all in an attempt to discern which of these versions truly occupies the present moment.

I was never really there is a commissioned work created for Obscura’s project, The world today, which represents the first and most extensive collection of native NFT photography. This collection features 13,800 unique 1/1 NFT photographs encompassing cities, landscapes, communities, people, events, and conceptual images, all captured during March and April of 2022.

I was really never there

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