Special Report

Shutdown: The Coronavirus

What Temporary Means: Portraits of family at home

Paulina through the mirror. Photo Guillermo Manning

When I came back home from New York, I knew the pictures I would take would have no method or logic other than to capture the new routines my sisters and mother and grandmother were slowly developing. We hadn’t been together like this in years.

Everyone assumed these new routines would be temporary––but what does temporary mean in a pandemic?

These pictures explore and exist in this limbo of time––joyful and memorable, but occasionally lonely and grim.

Time forcefully spent at home exacerbates experiences, making dull moments remarkable events: a phone call, opening a bottle of whiskey, looking at a mirror without reason. Everything could happen at the same time, the same day; then you realize it’s been weeks, your routine has become a ritual, and you haven’t been out of the house for months.

Mom’s bed, early in the morning.
Photo Guillermo Manning

Sofia working late at night while it rains.
Photo Guillermo Manning

Grandmother at her home.
Photo Guillermo Manning

Mom at home.
Photo Guillermo Manning

 

Grandmother having dinner and opening a bottle of whiskey. Photo Guillermo Manning

Mom working at home.
Photo Guillermo Manning

 

Mom visiting my grandmother for the first time in weeks.
Photo Guillermo Manning

Mom on the phone while Bombay listens.
Photo Guillermo Manning

Paulina riding a bike.
Photo Guillermo Manning

A picture of Paulina when she was four.
Photo Guillermo Manning

Grandmother greeting mom.
Photo Guillermo Manning

This is a project of  Lori Grinker’s  NYU graduate photojournalism class.

 

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