This deeply affecting experience led him to join the National Search Brigade for the Disappeared. While volunteering for the organisation, Bayo Gisbert has photographed more than 200 cases for forced disappearance from across Mexico.  

The bright flash used throughout the series gives a distinctly disorienting feeling, recalling both a rescue flashlight, and an exposing glare. The result is deeply uncertain, hovering somewhere between searching and hunting, between dream and nightmare. For Bayo Gisbert, the project aims to not only document the devastation and violence caused by these disappearances, but also to ask how a country with such deep rooted violence can heal. He asks, without firm foundations, can one truly build a solid home? 

MANUEL BAYO GISBERT works across photography and film, developing projects that explore identity, memory, and the echoes of violence in society. His photographic work has been published in international media like The New York Times and exhibited at cultural and institutional venues, while his films have screened at festivals, including Visions du Réel. He is currently preparing a feature documentary examining his relationship to Mexico’s history of violence.

ISABEL WALTER is a writer and curator based in Amsterdam. She currently works as Assistant Curator at Foam, and Editorial Assistant at Foam Magazine. She is particularly interested in art which expands the technical and conceptual boundaries of photography, moving image and new technologies.