The photographer avoids falling into a depiction of neutral academicism, striving instead to reveal the silent beauty of an almost entirely empty urban space, where the human figure has been reduced to a soulless shadow. The expressive framing evokes a metaphysical painting, but with the added value of the author’s subjectivity, as he captures places that hold personal significance. What renders the atmosphere so silent is the presence of light within a visually shadowy context. A few silhouettes of passersby appear faintly hinted at, captured from a distance.

This is a striking example of photography rivaling painting. Photography has always been the fastest medium for capturing and fixing an image in time, but it would be limiting to see it solely as a way to avoid anachronism. As Roberto Antelo demonstrates, photography is a kind of legacy left to those who observe it, study it, and fall in love with it—a legacy that allows us to experience a place and a time to which we do not belong.