ELEPHANT
by Dimitris Mytas
portfolio shortlisted call 'Urbanautica Institute Awards 2025', 2025
Category: Memories and Traditions
ELEPHANT is a personal photographic exploration of the “empty nest” syndrome, inspired by my son’s departure for his studies. His absence created a suffocating sense of emptiness in our home—an unspoken weight that felt like an elephant in the room.
In this void, I turned to my archive and rediscovered fragments of our shared past. Removed from their original context, these images acquired new meaning in the present. Alongside the archive, I also produced new photographic material, bringing different temporal layers into dialogue.
The project combines abstract elements with personal visual symbols, forming a restrained meditation on absence, transformation, and continuity. It concludes with the image of my child walking away in a snowy landscape—marking both his freedom to explore life and my quiet acceptance of this transition.