Matheus Bonafé: The silences and opacities of everyday life

Photographer Matheus Bonafé creates a body of work that inhabits the threshold between the visible and the invisible, between presence and absence. Dividing his time between São Paulo and cities in the countryside of São Paulo state, he develops a photographic practice born from the attentive observation of everyday life, turning the camera into an instrument of resistance against the culture of transparency and continuous visual performance. With a trajectory that began playfully at the age of 12, Bonafé found in photography not just a profession, but his main way of assimilating the world, becoming interested in images that preserve silences and opacities instead of revealing everything.

His image “Leaving Mass, Pirenópolis“, a finalist in the Single Image category of the FotoDoc Photo Contest 2025, is an eloquent example of this search for non-obvious meanings. Captured in 2019 in the historic city of Pirenópolis, Goiás, the photograph emerged from his continuous practice of street photography but now reveals itself as an anticipation of themes that would become central to his research. The strength of the image lies precisely in what it does not show: the hats that dominate the composition function as photographic signs that produce anonymity and archetype simultaneously, transforming concrete figures into “generic men” that echo an entire history of imagery. More than documenting a moment, the photograph raises questions about permanence and ephemerality, tensioning the photographic instant between the specific and the universal, the historical and the impermanent.

Learn more about this visual investigation and the projects that divide his production between the conceptual and the documentary in the following interview.

Paraíso – Imagem do Ensaio Parecer, de
Matheus Bonafé, selecionado no Prêmio Portfólio FotoDoc 2025

Loira – Imagem do Ensaio Parecer, de
Matheus Bonafé, selecionado no Prêmio Portfólio FotoDoc 2025

How old are you? Where do you currently live and work?

I am 32 years old. I divide my time between São Paulo and some cities in the countryside of the state.

Tell us about your journey in photography. When did you start photographing and why? What role does photography play in your life?

I started photographing at 12 years old, in a playful way. I was always curious about different ways of creating images, but it was in photography that I found results that satisfied me. Over time, this practice ceased to be just a hobby and became my profession and my main way of assimilating the world.

As an authorial photographer, my images are born from the direct observation of everyday life, seeking to tension the photographic instant between presence and absence. I am interested in photographs that do not reveal everything, that preserve silences and opacities, as a counterpoint to the culture of transparency and continuous visual performance.

Salto – Imagem do Ensaio Parecer, de
Matheus Bonafé, selecionado no Prêmio Portfólio FotoDoc 2025

Selva – Imagem do Ensaio Parecer, de
Matheus Bonafé, selecionado no Prêmio Portfólio FotoDoc 2025

Tell us about your finalist work for the FotoDoc Photo Contest 2025. When and where was it created? What is its concept? How does it fit into your photographic practice?

The photograph was taken in 2019, in the city of Pirenópolis, Goiás. It emerged as part of my continuous exercise in street photography: to record what catches my attention and that, in some way, seems worthy of permanence to me. I have a recurring interest in small towns, rural areas, and historic places. Although they are not exactly the theme of my work, they are often the setting where the images happen.

Today, revisiting this photo, I realize it was already anticipating some of the themes that have become more present in my current research. It is an image that, above all, does not answer: it raises questions. I believe its strength lies in the composition and the suggestion of something that is not shown. What we see are the hats. They interest me, not as objects in themselves, but as a recurring sign in the history of photography. They produce anonymity and archetype at the same time. They transform any figure into a “generic man,” almost a character repeated in time. In this way, it carries an echo of an entire history of imagery while also bringing something impermanent and ephemeral through the composition suspended at the moment of the click.

What projects are you currently working on? What are your near-future plans for photographic production?

Photographing on the street is a habit I maintain regardless of having a project in progress. Often, projects emerge from images made without prior intention.

I divide my production into two fronts: conceptual and documentary.

In the conceptual field, I am developing the project “Blind Veil” (“Véu Cego”), which investigates the collapse of visual experience in the age of hyper-exposure, exploring the tension between opacity and the compulsion to reveal.

In the documentary field, I am producing a work about rural life in the Várzea do Paraíba, in Tremembé (SP), a territory that is gradually disappearing under real estate and industrial pressure.