Imago Garage

In This Space I Live In, photographers from MEF (Movimento de Expressão Fotográfica) work together with youngsters under state custody in six educational centres throughout the country, using photography as a technical tool and a resource for personal expression. The centres are: the Educational Centre of Bela Vista and the Centre Navarro de Paiva, both located in Lisbon; Santo António in Porto; Santa Clara in Vila do Conde; Padre António Oliveira in Caxias; and Olivais in Coimbra.

The aim of the project is to foster self-knowledge and social skills using photography. The participants start by building their own pinhole darkrooms, also known as pinhole cameras. They then choose which places to photograph from amongst a number of possible spaces where the project is located. This can be outdoors or restricted to inside the Educational Centres, depending on the constraints imposed by the custodian sentence. Then, the participants develop and edit the pictures and, finally, they reflect on their work in a handcrafted notebook.

The project we are now presenting was carried out in 2020-22, in partnership with the General Directorate of Reinsertion and Prison Services - Ministry of Justice, and with the financial support of Novobanco and its program “Accounts with gestures that count”.