Traces of Fiction
2023
photo series
Tabernas is an research project in the Tabernas desert in Andalusia, Spain. From the 1950s onward it served as scenery for more than 500 Italian-Spanish western film productions, where it was used as a stand-in for the barren landscapes of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and Mexico.
This photo series searches for the traces that this fiction has embedded in the landscape and the community and looks at the seams where reality and fiction meet, and bears testimony to the economic necessity of keeping the fiction alive.
A scooter stands where horses used to rest.
An employee rides a few strides on one of the two horses at Western Leone who wait to be booked for a horseback tour through the valley.
Chairs bearing the names of the actors, directors, and musicians of the golden era of Italian westerns line the main street of the village.
