On This Side of the Mountain by Sebastian Liste

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On This Side of the Mountain

When I was seventeen I fell in love with Laura.

Then I met her family, and the way they lived fascinated me. Twenty years ago, Laura’s parents, Anne and Ben, came to Abdet, a small village in the Alicante mountains in Spain. There they began to build a house from the ruins of an abandoned stable, deep in a valley, just below a threatening ridge called ‘The Crag’. They built their home stone by stone, expanding it as the family grew, using rocks that fell from the mountain to construct not only the house, but a corral for animals and ponds to irrigate their land. They live in perfect harmony with their environment, respecting their place in nature and altering the landscape as little as possible.

At Abdet I made my first photographic experiments. This place has always been where I returned after every trip documenting far communities around the world. There I always found my family, my love and my refuge.

I started taking pictures at the same time I met Laura. For this reason, my relationship with photography has always been linked to the place where her family lives. Living in the middle of nature makes you make aware of your position in the world, to see the world in a properly scale and relativize the problems that arise in life. For this reason with this project I wanted to take an introspective turn to my work, documenting my immediate environment, exploring the strong relationships between love, family and land.

This photographs are visual interpretations of existing things, real feelings and thoughs. There we find humanity in all its states, wrought with imagination. To trasmit the emotions and tensions, typical from the familiar relationships, I had to enter into a psycological world that we can´t see. Not reality, but not direct fantasy either. More of a long and slow dance between the two worlds. Then I was able to make a poetic and visual map of my surroundings, recognizing fragments of a family memory not yet written, collecting the moments I hold close, those that make us reflect on our own lives and answer essential questions about what a family is.

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Sebastian Liste (1985, Alicante, SPAIN) is a photographer currently living in Brazil. He obtained a Bachelors degree in Sociology at the UNED, and a Master in the Arts in Photojournalism at the Autonomous University of Barcelona.

Sebastian won the 2010 Ian Parry Scholarship for his long term project “Urban Quilombo” about the extreme living conditions that dozens of families face who have set up home in an abandoned chocolate factory in Salvador de Bahia, Brazil. At the same time he was given a place on the Emerging Talent of Reportage by Getty Images, and since then became a Featured Contributor in Reportage by Getty Images in October 2011.

Sebastian’s extensive documentary work has focused on the lives of diverse communities around the world. By 2009, when Sebastian finished his undergraduate studies, he had visited over 20 countries, as Brazil, Laos, Ethiopia, Mexico, Mali, Cuba, Nepal, among others.

Currently, he is focus in two main projects in Latin America and the Mediterranean Sea area. Places where he grew up and he kwons well. On this long-term projects Sebastian explore the profound cultural and identity changes that occur in our contemporary world. Through his personal and intimate stories that fluctuate between documenting daily life in struggling communities to that of his own family.

Sebastian was chosen for the 2011 World Press Photo Joop Swart Masterclass.

His photographs have appeared at TIME Magazine, The Sunday Times Magazine, Photo District News, British Journal of Photography, FotoVisura, Burn Magazine and other publications.

His works has been exhibited internationally in galleries and festivals including the Getty Images Gallery, Host Gallery, Hotshoe Gallery and Mall Galleries in London, Espace Dupon and Spéos Gallery in Paris, Gallery 291 in San Francisco, VII Dumbo, Splashlight Studio Soho, PowerHouse Arena, New Atlantic Gallery in New York, Maison des Arts du Grütli in Geneva as well as in various galleries in Spain.
His work also have been show in international photo festivals as Visa pour L´Image in Perpignan, France; Noorderlicht Photo Festival in Groningen, Netherlands and the Angkor Photo Festival in Cambodia.

Liste´s work has been internationally recognized by POYi, NPPA, Sony WPO, Lucie Awards, Paris PX3, Photolucida, Anthropographia, Daylight/CDS Awards, CENTER Awards, Fotovisura Spotlight Grant, Reinassance Prize, Terry O´Neill Award, among others. In 2010 he was named the young editorial photographer of this year at IPA/Lucie Awards,

Sebastian is a featured photographer for Reportage by Getty Images.

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SEBASTIAN LISTE

+34 620848729

sebasliste@gmail.com

www.sebastianliste.com

Born in 1985 in Alicante, SPAIN

EDUCATION
Bachelor degree in Sociology, UNED, Spain 2009
Master in the Arts in Photojournalism, Universidad Autonoma de Barcelona, Spain 2010

EXPERIENCE
Reportage by Getty Images, Featured Photographer, 2011

COLLECTIONS
Sorigue Foundation | Lerida, SPAIN

ACCOLADES
2011
Joop Swart Masterclass participant, World Press Photo | Netherlands
Critical Mass, Top 50 Selected Artist | USA
POYi Emerging Vision Incentive, Finalist | USA
NPPA, Best of Photojournalism, honorable mention | USA
Daylight / CDS Photo Awards, Juror Pick winner | USA
Sony WPO Documentary/Photojournalism, shortlisted | UK
PX3, Young Photojournalist of the Year, silver medal | France
LOOK3 Festival, scholarship winner | USA
New York Photo Festival Awards, Honorable mention | USA
Anthropographia, selected photographer | Canada
Review Santa Fe participant | USA
CENTER Project Launch Award, honorable mention | USA
Nikon Photo Contest International, 2nd Prize | USA
Reinassance Prize, finalist | UK

2010
Ian Parry Scholarship winner | UK
Terry O´Neill Award winner | UK
Lucie Awards, Young Editorial Photographer of the Year | USA
Lucie Awards Discovery of the Year, finalist | USA
FotoVisura “Spotlight”, 3er Prize | USA
Lens Culture Awards, honorable mention | France
CPOY, Award of Excellence in Feature | USA
Albarracin Meeting of Photography, scholarship winner | SPAIN
EMERGENT International Festival of Photography and Visual Arts winner | Spain
Onward, selected photographer | USA
City of Gijon International Prize of Photojournalism, finalist | Spain
FOTO8 SummerShow, finalist | UK