LA INMORTALIDAD DE LA CANGREJA

A glimpse into a grandmother’s daily life and family home in South Florida, as seen by her granddaughter.

Director, Cinematographer, Editor: Lauren Guiteras
Sound Design: Andrés Acosta
Music: Liento

My grandmother, Juana Maria Rubio, and I could never rely on conversation to communicate with each other. Language barriers and her taciturn nature led me to seek out other avenues of connection with her.

When I started photographing her in my early twenties, I felt something profound, far deeper than anything that was possible for us to talk about. It wasn’t the resulting images themselves that bound me to her so much as it was the act of photography, the emergence of a shared moment and a state of communion between muse and artist. This was how I got to know her, and how she got to know me.

I don’t know much about the facts of her life. Other people have shared more of those with me than she did. What she shared with me directly was her being: the lines on her face; the flecks of cataracts in her pupils; the iconic, steep arches of her tattooed-on eyebrows; the rhythm of her steps; how gently she ate; the steadfast stewardship and reverent concentration she devoted to her garden.

LA INMORTALIDAD DE LA CANGREJA is the culmination of the time my grandmother, my camera, and I got to spend with each other. Making it crystalized a belief that I hold deeply and dear: Cinema is an act of love.