Memento mori is a photographic installation by Alejandro Javaloyas that meditates on time, image, and impermanence. The work was presented at Ultrafotografía, a group exhibition curated by Fernando Gómez de la Cuesta at Casal Solleric (Palma, 2025). Installed in the narrow passageway between the two wings of the mezzanine floor, the piece occupies the space like a silent, secular altar.
Composed of fifteen galvanized steel trays filled with water, each basin contains a submerged 1:1 color photocopy of white lily flowers—already wilted, already dead. Refracted and distorted by the water, these images exist in a state of suspension, simultaneously clear and dissolving. Over the course of the exhibition (June to October 2025), the water acts on the paper: the photographs degrade in real time, turning decay into an integral component of the piece.
A sixteenth photocopy, framed and hung low on the wall, shows a Latin passage from Tertullian’s Apologeticum: "Respice post te. Hominem te memento." (“Look behind you. Remember you are mortal.”) According to Roman tradition, these words were whispered into the ear of victorious generals during their triumphs. Here, they anchor the work’s reflection on mortality, fragility, and the quiet undoing of all images.
The installation recalls a cemetery, or perhaps an offering: each flower, both a dead body and a tribute. Drawing from the traditions of vanitas painting and the rituals of mourning, Memento mori reflects on photography not as a fixed image but as a vulnerable body. Influenced by ultrafotographic experimentation and the aesthetics of the 1990s school photocopier, the work revisits earlier investigations by Javaloyas, such as those presented in his 2023 solo show Floating Matter. It also forms part of a broader project, Jäälyhty, an ongoing meditation on memory, transformation, and the poetics of disappearance.
Installation photography by Juan David Cortés.