According to Argentinian photographer Romina Ressia everybody wears a mask. Masks are defense mechanisms that we use to not look weak in front of others. Our image is under constant surveillance and there are clear rules to abide to by in order to gain social acceptance. That makes it hard to distinguish between our real self and the constructed identities we adopt to please the others. The idea of beauty is a powerful influence from an early age on and that’s why Ressia’s Wonder Woman – who is shown as old and imperfect – reveals how values become undoubted facts in our collective memory: “As many other children, I have grown with the ideal of omnipotence, beauty, physical and supernatural powers. I have been told that evil never wins; that if I am in a dangerous situation, somebody else will save me, and that all stories have a happy ending… This project explores how we stand faced to the real world, as individuals, with the baggage we bring, which has been inculcated to us through cartoons, comics and fictional characters throughout our childhood. Explore how strongly those values and beliefs have been incorporated into the collective memory to the point that, to see these photographs, causes me opposed feelings. Even when I knew that the model was having fun at the time of shooting and the coffin was a simple prop made by me in Styrofoam”.

There’s also the passion for classic art, heavily influenced by Renaissance. Instead of being stereotypical, Ressia brings a fresh air to the style by mixing cubism and Renaissance postures & portraits, or adding brush strokes to cover the faces of her models.

Discover more of her award winning works below.