ABOUT LIMINAL SPACES AND LIMINAL PHOTOGRAPHY
The Importance of Urban Exploration — and How It Can Inspire Unique Photography
The word liminal comes from the Latin limen, meaning threshold.
To be in a liminal space is to stand at the edge of something new — not quite where you were, not yet where you’re going. It can be physical, emotional, or spiritual.
Abandoned places embody this perfectly. They once had purpose; now they linger between decay and rebirth. They invite curiosity, nostalgia and a strange sense of stillness.
Human beings have always been drawn to ruins — to their textures, their ghosts and the thrill of discovery. Like the treasure hunters of centuries past, we explore not only to find, but to feel.
Abandoned Hotel - Ponta Delgada, Açores (June 2025)
Today we call it urban exploration, or simply urbex — a practice deeply intertwined with photography.
Artists like Francesca Woodman often worked in deserted houses, turning the human body into a fleeting apparition. In her world, mirrors weren’t reflections — they were portals, thresholds between the living and the forgotten.
To be an urbexer is to play with imagination. Each room whispers its own history; each object becomes a trace of life once lived.
But photographing these spaces requires more than curiosity. It demands research, patience, and storytelling — understanding who once lived there, what they left behind and how to rebuild their atmosphere through light.
Everything starts with a story: the characters, the wardrobe, the setting.
A Victorian gown doesn’t belong in a 1980s shopping mall, just as vintage sunglasses feel wrong in an Art Nouveau villa.
Every element must serve the narrative.
My Liminal Photography Sessions — both portrait and architectural — are the culmination of this vision.
With over ten years of experience, I create photographs that evoke nostalgia and magical realism, as if stepping back into a forgotten era of beauty and style.
