The selection of works gathered in this exhibition by Montserrat Soto (Barcelona, 1961), carried out between 1996 y 2001, It is located at a key moment in its career, in which the artist consolidates an investigation focused on perception, space and the construction of the gaze. Far from understanding photography as a recording device, Soto conceives it as a mediation mechanism. What appears in your images is not reality itself., but a displaced reality, filtered, rebuilt. The photographic image functions simultaneously as “pseudopresence and a sign of absence.”. This tension—between what is there and what is missing—constitutes one of the fundamental axes of his work.. In these works, the viewer takes center stage. The systematic absence of human figures does not imply emptiness, but a direct invitation to the symbolic occupation of that space. The work is not complete without the presence of the body that runs through it.: It is in that activation where the image acquires its full condition of experience.. It is not about, therefore, to contemplate passively, but to go through, inhabit and project. Presented in large formats, The images expand towards an almost installation dimension that intensifies this physical relationship, placing the viewer within the field of the work rather than in front of it.
One of the recurring elements in this period is the appearance of structures that act as limits: thresholds, openings or incomplete architectures. These “barriers” do not function solely as physical obstacles., but as perceptive devices that intensify the gaze. By preventing direct access, create a paradox: the more the passage is blocked, the more the imagination is activated, pushing the viewer to “see beyond what usually enters the eyes”. In this sense, the arch motif—present in Untitled (Bows)— takes on a particularly significant dimension. The arch, like the frame, It is not a decorative element, but a threshold: a place of transition between the visible and the invisible, between what is shown and what is left out of field. From a formal point of view, These works also reveal a metalinguistic dimension: they don't just show spaces, but they reflect on the very act of looking.
As indicated in the essay, The photographic gesture can be understood as a “cut” in space and time, an interruption that separates and at the same time builds meaning . The image is not, therefore, a totality, sino un fragmento que señala tanto lo que incluye como lo que excluye. En este conjunto, Soto articula una práctica que oscila entre lo sensorial y lo conceptual. Sus imágenes, aparentemente silenciosas, operan como dispositivos de activación: invitan a una contemplación que no es evasiva, sino crítica. El espectador no solo observa, sino que se enfrenta a su propia posición dentro del espacio, del tiempo y de la memoria. En última instancia, estas obras plantean una pregunta persistente: ¿qué significa realmente ver? La respuesta no se encuentra en la imagen misma, sino en el umbral que se abre entre ella y quien la contempla.
