CORRIDA

The Corrida series stems from Ivailo Stanev’s sustained engagement with the ritual structures of contemporary tauromaquia. Rather than focusing on spectacle, the work turns toward the quieter thresholds that shape the tradition — the pauses, preparations and gestures that precede action. In these spaces, the arena is not yet a site of performance but a field of concentration, where role, identity and discipline momentarily align. Stanev approaches this world with measured observation, allowing its internal rhythm to surface without emphasis or judgment.

The photographs weave together the sensory and the psychological: the weight of embroidered fabric, the choreography of hands tightening a jacket, the suspended stillness before entering the light. Interiors, corridors and fragments of the arena reveal a continuum of states in which individuals negotiate presence under the demands of tradition. Through restrained composition and controlled use of light, the series follows the movement from inward focus toward outward enactment, tracing the emotional and physical tension that defines these transitional moments.

Within Stanev’s broader practice, Corrida functions as both documentary study and reflection on ritualised behaviour. The work acknowledges the historical and cultural density of tauromaquia while maintaining a clear, unembellished visual language. What emerges is neither celebration nor critique, but an examination of a world understood through its smallest shifts — the gestures that prepare the body, the atmosphere that shapes intention, the silence that precedes form. Seen together, these photographs register the tradition through its most human intervals, offering a grounded and enduring account of a practice held between continuity and change.