Daniel Reuter, Providencia, 2020

Providencia—providence—in its biblical meaning, describes God’s intervention in the universe, an influence beyond human control. The Providencia neighbourhood of Santiago de Chile provides both setting and title for this new series by Daniel Reuter. Architectural details, glass reflections, makeshift structures, barricades that obstruct the view. Figures appear, the reiteration of a narrator, or characters living within a fractured narrative? Reuter’s Providencia describes a place locked between a complicated past and an uncertain future. Beneath a surface layer of the quotidian, we sense the last big wave of western aspirations crashing down, conjuring the dreams and disenchantment of a world in upheaval.