Invisible Strings

My project explores family bonds during my brother’s addiction amid Lebanon’s instability. Through 15 images, it reflects on personal struggles, generational trauma, and how external pressures shaped our family and path back to each other.

My focus is on bonds, specifically within my family. This project is inspired by a difficult period of addiction my brother experienced, which placed immense strain on our family, already under pressure from Lebanon’s political instability. Rising tensions tested our relationships until he reached a breaking point. He overdosed and was in a coma for a few days. With family scattered across the world—my mother in Brazil, my sister in Dubai, and my father in Portugal—the distance, both physical and emotional, felt vast. Yet, within 48 hours, we were all under the same roof. A traumatic event like this often drives families apart, but for us, it became the opposite: he became the glue, reconnecting our hearts and clearing our communication.

Composed of 15 images, the series reflects on how personal struggles and generational trauma shape an individual’s mental and emotional state. It explores how external realities enter the home and influence family dynamics, highlighting the power of the family unit and the matriarch, showing that there is strength in love.

The photos are accompanied by an original audio piece created for this project, combining real voice notes that capture my brother’s breaking point and our family dynamics with the matriarch’s words of wisdom, all tied together by an eerie, emotionally fractured melody.

At its core, the series tells the story of how my brother stepped out of the darkness toward us, and how we found our way back to each other.

This project was shot in December 2025, when we reunited in Brazil after the traumatic events of the previous year. It was a deeply spiritual and healing time, and I feel blessed both to have shared it with my family and to have documented it authentically as part of our journey.

This project was created as part of a residency with Hunna Arts & Culture in Lebanon, running from September 2025 to January 2026, and was initiated by Flavia Bechara.