Exercise on Balance with Spondylus is a series of three photographic self-portraits exploring the relationship between the body, spirituality, ancestral memory, and displacement.
In this work, I perform a physical exercise of balance while carrying objects on my head and hands, including the spondylus shell, a sacred material in pre-Columbian Andean cultures associated with offerings, fertility, abundance, and communication with the spiritual world.
The spondylus also carries histories of movement and exchange, travelling across territories through ancient Andean networks. Through this object, I reflect on my own experience of displacement and the ways ancestral knowledge continues to inhabit the body.
The act of balancing becomes an ongoing exercise of adaptation—a negotiation between the weight of memory, cultural identity, and the landscapes we inhabit. The body becomes a vessel connecting ancestral spirituality with contemporary life.