Man and his horse returning home after a days work

The Douro river

With the title taken from a popular expression from the Douro and Trás-os-Montes region, this work reflects about the people that leave beyond the slopes of the Douro River, engrained in the land that sustains it’s hunger and the faith that points towards the skies.

Hand holding grapes during the harvest season.

Involved in a mythical image of a land with history, consecrated and celebrated by the aristocracy in the nectar that it produces, the beloved Port Wine, it denounces in the same way one of Western Europe’s poorest regions and last frontiers of rural life, where the ties with nature and religion are still very strong and visible.

Religious ceremony during outumn celebrations

The Donkey is still a common sight both as a needed help in the farm and everyday work, and as a companion for the elder people

During the winter days, the fireplace is a necessity constantly in flames both day and night

However and despite the land desertification and low economic strength, the situation of hunger is never a chance since the basic needs are still guaranteed by the traditional work in agriculture and animal farming. Religion on the other hand continues to be of a sharp social relevance, well demonstrated by the recent referendum on the abortion, where the north-interior of Portugal mostly opposed and voted against, due to the major influence of the church and the conservative character of the region.

Man pruning a peach tree during the winter time.

 

Sheep herding around an abandoned boat.

Man with candles at local church

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The many national and global economic, political and social changes of the last decades and it’s reflection on the local communities, together with the desire of younger generations to look away for better opportunities and future that home can not guarantee, left many small places with few habitants mostly elderly with the occasional younger face born out of a family still resisting the appeal of the big town.

 

Woman carrying old vineyards on top of her head

 

However it rejuvenates temporarily during the summer holidays season when all those that went away return mostly during it’s religious and popular festivities to visit home, family and friends, portraying a very particular facet of Portugal recent identity.

Woman fulfilling her promise during the summer popular and religious festivities

 

A raw day-by-day of the human condition holding strengths with the elements that surround him either in harmony or conflict, so distant of the urban comforts of the city behind the horizon, conveying metaphors not always poetic of a particular time and place allied to a strong feeling of belonging.

 

Man at local bar enjoying the late afternoon.

 

 

Dogs fighting

Despite the social changes, the tradition killing of the pig by a group of men is still common, during the colder months of winter

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The work represents a human relation with nature and faith vanishing in a pitiless confront with new social, economic and political realities and challenges, soon to be presented only as part of tourist broachers, and replaced with more urban landscapes of an always late modernity. It is a visual representation of the opposite end of the chain of evolution and progress that brings with it the disappearance of past values.

 

Woman collecting old vineyards as the new cycle begins

 

Polluted Landscape

 

Still deprived of most modern commodities, an old man warms up the night at his fireplace