These unique three-dimensional hand-constructed works in this series are part of my continuous exploration of portraiture as a reflection of the energy and complexity of the human being. As when we see our face reflected in running water, it’s never static—we are constantly moving, our states of mind shifting and evolving; we are like a perfect machine creating moments in our life.

This Series is made up of different stages, starting in 2016 when I decided to dedicate myself full time to making my own contemporary photography (after being an editorial photographer for 30 years). I began to research, catalog, and study the archives of the four generations of photographers of my family, especially the photographs of my grandfather Armando Herrera legendary studio, which in turn represent life in Mexico from the 30s to the 90s.

My intention in this stage V of my Disassemble Series, is to learn about my grandfather’s photographic technique, through the reinterpretation of his extraordinary portraits that span around 80 years. From his analogue photographs through my artistic exploration of portraits, I create new images made with digital photography, which try to decipher symbolic meanings, technological changes, and resonances in society over time.

Starting from these new versions that I make of his portraits, I explore a way to materialize my perception of the energy and complexity of the people I portray, through the creation of three-dimensional photographic sculptures, which I build manually, and that demonstrate the bond that I generate when portraying a person and transforming it into a conceptual structure of energy. At this stage I refer to “string theory”, which suggests that there are only very fast-moving filaments of energy in the form of various frequencies and wavelengths in our physical bodies, and this is how I construct the pieces by weaving with the images and wires, threads, fabrics.

Each of these photo sculptural constructions begins with a portrait made by Armando Herrera between 1936 and 1956, in the so-called "Golden Age of Mexican Cinema" and a reinterpretation of it made by me, Lou Peralta (his granddaughter). The final piece is a photographic sculpture: consisting of sublimation-printed fabric or archival pigment prints on Hahnemühle paper, cut into strips to be woven through the handcrafted red copper wire materials, making their shapes become three dimensional. The pieces dimensions vary in height between 9 and 55 inches.