JOEL JIMENEZ JARA

Costa Rica

website

Castle of Innocence

Présentation

Castle of Innocence immerses us in the imaginary space of the Costa Rican Children's Museum and its past as a former central prison, to examine the power dynamics at work in the control of narratives and the construction of history.
Working with prison-era archives, reconstructed prison cells, and symbolic objects and settings from the Children's Museum, the project questions the use of photography as a document of historical truth, the role of memory in reconstructing identities, and the influence of the past in our relationship to present realities.
The project uses a non-linear narrative to confront the imprints of trauma and violence from the building's past as a prison with the reconstructed environments of the current museum. This creates a new interpretive space in which recurrences and contradictions appear. The boundaries between reality and fiction dissolve and a renewed sense of place emerges.
The imagery that makes up the series develops a disquieting atmosphere, echoing the processes of information retention and mythology building. Various leitmotifs are used, such as the repetition of artefacts related to the evaluation of knowledge and behaviour in the archive material, using juxtapositions and interventions on the images. The study of the Children's Museum offers a ground for reflection on the passivity of our gaze towards images, the role of the imagination on our understanding of reality, and the porosities between notions of protection and control in our post-truth era.