In 2017, Portugal was devastated by the deadliest forest fires ever registered in the country’s history. Between June and October more than a hundred people died.  Particularly in the central region, these fires consumed more than 440,000 ha of woodland and bush – a new record number of burned area, according to official data. Atypical weather conditions such as severe droughts and multiple heat waves were pointed as the main cause. Affecting the local population, a lacking on the part of the authorities’ first response left people feeling unassisted and abandoned to their fortune while seeing their houses and livelihoods engulfed by the blaze.

A young man and refugee, at dusk in a winter day of 0C, after bathing with water heated in a fire set under a bridge somewhere near the Serbia-Croatia border. Since the closing of EU borders in the Balkans on the 1st of February 2016, hundreds of refugees try to survive along this frontier – in a place they have come to name as “the jungle” – without any resources and facing police persecutions on a daily basis.

During the driest summer of the last 90 years, forest fires took hold of the central and northern regions of the country. In Tondela, on the night of October the 15th 2017, the flames invaded the whole council and eventually entered the city. Without enough firemen to combat the blaze in all its fronts, locals tried to contain the flames using every means at hand.

Rafael Leão kicks his team fellow Matheus Oliveira in the face at the Oleiros Municipal Stadium during the playoff between ARC Oleiros and Sporting CP on the qualifiers’ third round of the Portugal Cup 2017/18.

More than 100 people died in the forest fires in Portugal – 2017 was the most tragic year ever in the nation’s modern history. High temperatures, strong winds and drought combined resulted in 523 fires in a single day in October. In June, the fire in Pedrogão Grande took a whole week to be put down completely leaving behind a trail of 64 deaths and material damage amounting to 500 million EUR. In the first moments, when many died inside their cars while trying to escape the flames or trapped in their homes, a communication fail with the Civil Protection services left the locals abandoned to their misfortune. In the Coimbra region and in October alone, 45 people died and approximately 1000 houses were left totally destroyed.

The archaic and rough world of uplands and mountains linking the Minho region to Trás-os-Montes.  The relation between natural conditions and human effort knits a thick thread with which we can try to understand its people and places. Stepping along the fragile lines separating a present disconnected from any idea of a future, “Ancient Massif” attempts to account the transformation of the rural world in Portugal – it does so by observing the processes with a bear on belief systems, spiritualties, and ways of life.

It does not exist if we cannot see it. Yet there it stands. A labyrinth of brick and gravel conceals it from sight and blurs our curiosity – the Bairro 6 de Maio neighbourhood in Lisboa does exist, even if against our wishes. A slum-like settlement inhabited by Portuguese-African renegades melts with a living theatre of underworld deals. Only the shock tops the piles of rubbish – at every corner, to find the stories of people who have almost given up humanity, doing what they can to survive: drugs, guns, and prostitution. Yet the most deafening noise is the silence of the capital city.

Considered one the most uncontrollable drug markets in Oporto, Bairro do Aleixo neighbourhood is not what it used to be. Only 3 residential towers remain from the original 5. The demolition process, which started in 2011 and sought to put an end to the social problems, is now stalled. Some dwellers wish to stay in the houses where they were born while others fight daily to change their lives. These towers still house more than 300 people. At Tower 1 the absence of a functional lift leaves dwellers, particularly those with health conditions, stranded at home and stuck in an unhealthy environment of dampness and shambles.

52 years to come full circle. In 1965, during the Colonial War in Angola, a group of Portuguese soldiers found a baby in the woods. They baptised her with the name ‘Isabel Batata Doce’ [‘Isabel Sweet Potato’] and brought her to Portugal where she grew up unknowing of her past. These pictures account the days of Isabel’s return to her homeland where she rediscovered her family’s smiles and cried walking down the same paths of her fateful lost – where she came to understand who she is and sees herself reborn. The images were taken in June 2017.

With more than two millennia, Braga is one of the oldest Christian cities in the world with a vast religious heritage and a city centre brimming with ancient churches. Dating back to the 5th century, the celebrations of the Holy Week are marked by four major processions which also come to attract thousands of tourists.  The Steps Procession [Procissão dos Passos] takes place on Palm Sunday; on Wednesday, the Procession of Our Lady of the “Burrinha”; the Procession of Ecce Hommo, on Thursday; and, on Friday, the Theophoric Procession of The Lord’s Burial.

An utter hell on Earth. June and October 2017 – for two months, Portugal swallowed in deep grief and struggled to come to grips. More than a hundred deaths, homes destroyed, lives of hard work swept away by an uncontrollable fire. Many people were left abandoned to their fortune and fought the flares with all the strength they could muster. The aftermath was a time of pouring emotions amidst the overwhelming smell of burnt that lasted for days and months.

Wound is a photography essay on breast cancer in the Woman and the conflict arising between sickness and Love. My approach was to work with a female group aged 25 to 45. The condition does not single out age or social class. Many women are abandoned by their partners at the early stage of diagnosis. Other times, relationships get lost in the calvary of treatments. Only a few men make through the calvary. And then there are mothers and sons sharing the uncertainty and the suffering each day brings. Love is put at odds. A fight is set against abandonment and loneliness.

One action and its effect. A group of barbers participates in a voluntary initiative with homeless and destitute citizens in collaboration with Acredito, a not-for-profit organisation for homelessness assistance. “Mai Novo” [“younger”] was the reply I heard the most every time I asked how they felt afterwards. They also spoke of being regarded with more reverence and respect. The barbers – Carlos, Edson, João Ramos, João Pereira, João Rato, Ricardo, and Bruno – jointly with José Pinto, Carmo Fernandes and all the people from Acredito show us that we can always do something to affect the life of another person for the better.

Alexandre Albernaz is one of several Paralympic athletes who, day after day, struggles with the limitations of a life already bound and made more difficult in the absence of the due financial support by the state. With paraplegia since he was six, in 2016 Alexandre fulfilled his dream of participating in the Olympics in Brazil even though he didn’t get to compete. His daily routine stretches from his house to the swimming pool where he practices everyday even if it takes two busses to make the 10 km. “In the water, that’s where I feel good, there we’re all the same.”

The cartography of Portuguese emigration is made of wrinkles – of grooves in the border and in the faces. Departure is indelibly associated with need and the practice of resistance and escape from a precarious living – hence also associated to the stigma of submission and clandestinity. A scar that is also a tattoo – an indelible mark of pride, a builder of identity, moored to the rivers, ranges and bridges, to secret codes, to complicities between people and animals. To “take the leap” or “off in a bout” are common expressions we associate with the illegal emigration to France particularly during the 60s.

A generation of students without borders. Skilled in any subject in any area. Engaging with the new technologies with which they manage their time, where and how to use it. Intelligent and innovators but also responsible and aware of what goes on around them. And they have fun. The students of today enjoy a type of freedom unknown to and never experienced by former generations. They express their wishes and reclaim their rights. No more local minded, they have become de facto global citizens. To think small is past – they think big. This is ‘generation X’.