In his new work, the artist and photographer Jordi Bernadó travels in search of a world that disappears. Last and Lost is a series of eight photographs displayed in a solo exhibition at Galería Senda starting January 24. These eight pieces are part of a larger project, still ongoing, in which the artist asks himself about the ecological and philosophical challenges of the present. Issues such as sustainability, the relationship between technology and nature, the horizons of the future, and democracy are fundamental in this new work.

The Last and Lost exhibition focuses on the environmental dimension, creating a reflection on the loss and human destruction of nature. The eight photographs portray lost places, ecosystems in danger of extinction, areas uninhabitable due to pollution, or forms of life that struggle to survive. Each image shows a reality that is about to cease to be so. The artist becomes a witness and spectator of an ambiguous state between existing and non-being.

An archive of losses: from the oldest tree in the world, Old Tjikko, in Sweden, whose roots are more than 9,565 years old, to the most remote and inaccessible lake, Lac Télé, in the Republic of the Congo, an immense mirror of sewage in the middle of nature, or the desolate landscapes of Zone Rouge, in France, devastated by the explosives and chemical spills of the First World War, whose entry is prohibited and much of the area is considered unrecoverable.

Bernadó also travels to the Great Blue Hole in Belize, to the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, to Racetrack Playa in California and Nevada, to the Danakil Desert in Ethiopia, and to the Doha Desert in Qatar, where the famous sculptures by Richard Serra East-West/West-East. At each destination, he encounters scenes of extinction and yet strange flashes of light.

Bernadó flees alarmism and resignation. It emphasizes the human will and appeals to the desire to nourish life and preserve beauty. It urges us to look into the unknown and question our actions.

His interest in landscape and identity has marked Bernadó’s work throughout his career. In recent years, his interest in the way we tell ourselves about the world—and how we construct fiction about the future and uncertainty—has taken on special relevance in his artistic practice. Last and Lost is the first chapter of an ambitious, long-term project that aims to put these fictions of the world in images and reflect on the possibilities of action (and narration) in the face of contemporary challenges.

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