Praeter Tempus — a Latin expression meaning “beyond time” — is a photographic project developed in the city of Coimbra, Portugal, through the gaze of a Colombian photographer who has made the city his home. The work unfolds as a series of photographic dérives that explore Coimbra as a space where past and present coexist, resisting linear narratives of time and urban order.
Departing from classical ideals of planning and visual coherence, Coimbra reveals an architecture shaped by centuries of cultural, political, and emotional accumulation. Its urban fabric embraces diversity, imperfection, and aesthetic freedom, standing in contrast to the visual homogeneity promoted by many contemporary cities. Here, disorder is not neglect but a logic of use, affection, and repair — an everyday ethic where beauty emerges from what is lived rather than what is new.
The project reflects on the idea of beauty and questions its normative frameworks, proposing an understanding of the urban landscape as profoundly human and unresolved. This approach is echoed in the editorial form of Praeter Tempus, conceived as two intertwined volumes that invite the reader to construct their own path through the work, extending the notion of dérive into the act of reading.
Coimbra becomes, in this context, an open archive of time, memory, and coexistence — an inexhaustible source for photographic exploration.
Praeter Tempus is currently in an advanced editorial stage, with a complete physical book mock-up and a fully developed digital editorial maqueta. The complete project is available for institutions, publishers, and collaborators upon request. The images presented here represent a selected fragment of the work. Praeter Tempus unfolds fully within the book format, where the complete body of work reveals its narrative, rhythm, and editorial intention.
