“My name is Ana and I am a love addict” – says artist Ana Vallejo while trapped in her apartment with anxieties when COVID-19 hit New York City in 2020. This started a personal investigation to dissect and find the source of her addiction. She merged neuroscience, psychology, images, and anonymously sourced data. She photographed partners, friends and family members with whom she shared similar relationship experiences. She discovered that emotional and physical abuse makes us develop an insecure attachment style with dysfunctional coping mechanisms, making us prone to addictions. She realised her intense infatuations were a way to anaesthetise a life-long emotional pain. Using an interdisciplinary scrutinisation, Neuromantic delves into dysfunctional relationships to ultimately highlight why healthy bonds and trauma integration are necessary for our well-being.
Ana Vallejo (Colombia) is an interdisciplinary mixed media artist based in New York. With a background in biology, she develops research-based and experimental projects that invite change and collaboration to delve into human perception, memory and emotions. Vallejo feels a visceral attraction toward colour, using it as a vehicle to transmit sensations. Interested in the nuances of everyday life, she believes that empathy is essential to achieving intimacy and honesty in photos. She graduated from the New Media Narratives program at the International Center of Photography in NYC. While exhibiting her work internationally, in 2021 she was nominated for the Foam Talent and won the 1st prize of the PhMuseum Women Photographers Grant.
From 23 September to 2 October 2022 the second edition of the PhMuseum Days photography festival will take place at DumBO space in Bologna, Italy. The event is curated and organized by PhMuseum, an incubator of photographic talents, with the aim of becoming one of the most interesting festivals on the European calendar while contributing to placing Bologna among the cities of reference for contemporary photography.
The chosen theme is Today is Yesterday’s Tomorrow, intended as an opportunity to reflect on the powerful moment of change we are living through. The event will be a playground for professionals and a moment of discovery for those who want to get closer to photography and the visual arts. The program includes individual exhibitions, a collective installation, portfolio reviews, screenings, performances and a space dedicated to independent publishing.
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