LSD - Lockdown Street Diary

LSD is a one-year project started at the end of 2020, born with the idea of showcasing life in London from a newbie point of view who moved right in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic. A project that in its course has proved to be a therapeutic tool for myself to overcome isolation. LSD, Lockdown Street Diary, depicts bits of life before, during, and after the lockdown capturing the complexities of human connections and disconnections in the urban environment with all its limitless failures in this unprecedented time. The conditions of total or semi-isolation that many of us have experienced, have acted as a kind of catalyst to fuel existential fires and prompt us to ask ourselves what we really value. What is worth pursuing? For me that pursuit became "communication". Despite human contacts had been largely restricted, through forced distancing and lack of access to the usual way of communicating, I have decided to use photography as a medium to re-establish a connection with people. As many others trapped in a semi-isolated reality for a never-before experienced amount of time, I have been forced into thinking clearly about the condition of my life and interests. In spite of restrictions, or perhaps even because of them, I was able to turn my photographs into records of my values, tastes and identity. What has come to light in many cases is an emphasis on human solitude, sensitivity, vulnerability, joy, and hope documented through street photography. In hindsight, having a direct mean to express myself in diverse ways through photographs, has given me an effective weapon for fighting against the psychological pressure that has been exacerbated by the pandemic. The photos presented here are a short selection of the whole project that capture the toughest period of the lockdown and few fragments after it, when life seems to flow back to normal.