In “Sweet Thing,” a Cuban-born photographer turns a fragmented family history into a haunting visual meditation on slavery, memory, and identity. Sparked by a casual question at a family reunion in Belgium, the artist confronts how the transatlantic slave trade severed names, ties, and stories, making conventional genealogy nearly impossible. Since traditional records are largely unavailable, the project weaves together archival images, contemporary photographs of ancestral places, and staged self-portraits, with sugar serving as a potent metaphor throughout. The intentionally blurred visuals mirror how memory fades and fractures over time, while visits to two declining sugar communities in Cuba ground the work in real landscapes of displacement. Ultimately, the series argues that remembering—however incomplete—is an ethical act that resists historical erasure.
The Guardian
