As in Rembrandt’s work and in Caravaggio’s chiaroscuro, in the series Resilience in the Dark by American photographer Will Kraus, semi-darkness does not act as a limitation, but as an ally: a presence that, far from concealing, helps to reveal.
Shadows are the organizing principle of these images, in which bodies, streets, and the interiors of homes are drawn out of the night by a precarious light: the glow of a mobile phone, the headlights of a vehicle, some artificial lighting that casts a red hue over a façade, or a lamp that concentrates its glow on a board game. In each setting, we see a scene shaped by circumstances rather than determined by individuals; everything that takes place belongs to a provisional, improvised state. Cubans must always be prepared to do what they can, rather than what they want to do. This lack of agency unfolds in a context that is illuminated precariously, time and again, reaffirming its existence and generating a constant state of alertness.
The series emerges from a specific situation: Cuba’s energy crisis and its consequences for everyday life. Kraus, however, moves away from a catastrophic vision and focuses instead on the human capacity for resilience and adaptability. Far removed from mere illustration or straightforward description, his gaze centers on a more complex question: what happens to our perception when electricity can no longer be taken for granted? The question has an aesthetic dimension, but also an ethical and human one: a blackout does not simply mean an interruption in the electricity supply; it disrupts the rhythms of the city, transforms the intended use of public and private spaces, and changes the conditions under which people work, interact, and—when they can—rest.
In much of the photographic tradition, sharpness and the legibility of detail are values associated with technical mastery of the medium. Kraus rejects full visibility as an indispensable measure of success and demonstrates how human ingenuity can overcome any difficulty. In this series, the traditional values of photography cease to be absolute objectives. Here, deep shadows, indistinct contours, and incomplete visual information are legitimate and intentional devices that contribute conceptually to communication with the viewer, because they form part of the expressive structure of the photographs.
The conventional documentary logic is reversed here: rather than offering the viewer an exhaustive view of a scene, the artist seeks to convey the very conditions under which that event can be perceived. The image goes far beyond showing a city in darkness; it allows us to experience something of that darkness. Its expressive language becomes an extension of the experience it explores.
Light, the desired and longed-for protagonist, establishes a hierarchy of presences within the images. The illumination is never uniform: a figure may emerge from a dark background, a building may acquire a dazzling chromatic intensity, or the beam of a motorcycle headlight may become the spotlight of a nocturnal street. Emerging mysteriously from a car’s headlights, light does not restore the space in its entirety; it partially reveals it, concealing the unknown and suggesting what remains unseen, at times even with an erotic undertone, since darkness often harbors everything that is forbidden.
There is a constant tension between what light allows us to know and what we infer about what we cannot see. The image acquires a narrative structure, built around the suggestion of what might be happening in the half-light. The viewer does not know what is taking place beyond the frame and therefore imagines it; this becomes their interpretation of the event, as they piece together what has not been told, wondering who the figures lingering in the shadows might be, where the light comes from, and what circumstances preceded the photographed moment. Photography sets the viewer’s interpretation in motion not only through what the illuminated area reveals, but also through what the shadows conceal.
In his work Red Dawn, the artist presents a reddish façade that feels somewhat theatrical, suspending the human figures within an unreal setting. The photograph’s expressive intensity and visual quality alter our perception of the place, capturing a moment in which the lighting transforms the everyday into something extraordinary.
In a piece such as Walk between the Light, darkness transforms the urban space into a stage where light manifests itself with an almost material density; it spills across the façade, fragmenting it, while accompanying the passage of figures who oscillate between uncertainty and the everyday. Light reconstructs the physical space; the figures, absorbed by the night, heighten the sense of fragility. The image seems to tell us that, through adaptation, people turn what once appeared exceptional into an everyday experience.
The title of the series, Resilience in the Dark, directs the viewer’s interpretation toward the human capacity to sustain life and reinvent oneself despite living in adverse conditions. The artist does not depict extraordinary acts of survival, but ordinary forms of functioning: walking down a street, sharing a table, talking… or concentrating on an activity while the surrounding environment loses its familiar points of reference.
Nota de traducción: He optado por Between the Visible and the Invisible para el título y Resilience in the Dark para el de la serie, ya que ambas formulaciones mantienen el sentido del original y funcionan con naturalidad en inglés dentro del contexto de la crítica de arte. Asimismo, he traducido «falta de poder de decisión» como lack of agency, una expresión habitual en el discurso crítico que conserva el matiz de pérdida de capacidad para decidir sobre las propias circunstancias.
