In #7, From La Piedra Sustituta Series 2020, Sierra shifts the emphasis toward concealment as strategy. The body appears partially hidden, adopting the stone as shield rather than burden. This gesture reframes vulnerability as negotiation: protection becomes self-imposed before it can be externally enforced. The photograph advances Sierra’s ongoing inquiry into self-regulation—how individuals internalize surveillance and preemptively obscure themselves to avoid being “pointed at.” The aesthetic austerity intensifies the psychological reading, positioning the nude form between fragility and resistance.
Showing a body that is hidden is the aesthetic apology for the insane judgment that the artist himself has taken as an excuse for not being 'pointed at' or rather as self-pointing. The stone is taken by the body that is unprotected as a metaphor for the weakness that seeks protection, and the body is taken by the stone as a consequence of an insecure state, how can a stone take a body? If this is the one that "institutionally" does it.
A body study of concealment and symbolic protection within contemporary conceptual nude photography. Jose Sierra, 2020. Available at The Art Design Project, Miami Beach.
