Yolanda del Amo’s photographs manage to tell as much of a story in a single image as a novel, play, or film do. Whole stories seem to unfold in her highly intense shots.

Her series Archipelago, created between 2004 and 2014, shows scenes that seem to capture reality: the feelings, tensions, and emotions that connect (or divide) two people in a relationship. But the impression of reality is an illusion: the portraits, which at first appear to be social studies, are in fact meticulously arranged and purely fictional moments from invented stories. The surroundings are mere stage settings; the people portrayed are actors whose gestures and expressions have been directed by the photographer. Every detail, including each pose, has been carefully choreographed by Del Amo. The result is a blend of psychological tension and ingenious visual grace.

Strongly influenced by the expressive dance theater of Pina Bausch, Del Amo succeeds in conveying a wide range of emotions through her photographs. She examines the (individual) needs, desires, longings, and constraints that are part of every partnership. Her tableaux create a form of hyper-reality–a reality that is exaggerated just enough to have a disturbing effect, subtly and unconsciously. Del Amo’s images thus achieve an unusual combination of internal and external world, an illusion of reality accompanied by an eerie sense of unreality.