ISLEÑO

In this series, I reflect on the connection between birth, motherhood, and the sea that surrounds my hometown: Havana. Since childhood, the ocean has been a space of freedom and belonging. I remember escaping with friends from my mother's watchful eye to dive into the "pocetas" of the Malecón, those natural pools formed among the rocks. Unknowingly, I was perhaps seeking a symbolic return to her womb, to that primary refuge.

Today, as an adult and an islander, I embrace my bond with the sea as a son's relationship with his mother: protective, vast, sometimes tempestuous, but always present. I photograph the children who, like me in the past, bathe along the Malecón, capturing that instant of innocence and connection with the ancestral. The sea, like motherhood, is origin and destiny, a space that welcomes us and defines us.

Through these images, I seek to explore how salt water weaves memories and roots identities. Havana, surrounded by the sea, is also a metaphor for the womb that contains us and casts us into the world. These children, playing among the waves, repeat a ritual that transcends generations, uniting birth, territory, and the unconditional love of that which sustains us.

To my mother; where I always return.