It was the summer of 2017 when I first visited Chania. An almost chance encounter, not much had been planned that summer, but that’s how great loves begin. I immediately thought that this was the perfect dimension for me, a city that envelops you with its colours, scents, culture, and people – an explosive mix that calls you back every time you leave her. “You will feel the pull” once I was told. And so I returned again in the summer of 2019 and then again in 2020 where I had the fortune to spend two wonderful months.
Chania was different in the summer of 2020. I usually photograph people I meet on the street, I stop them, I talk to them and listen to their stories, then I ask if I can capture that moment in a shot. That human connection that is established will then turn into an image that will be able to bring the observer into the scene. All of this seems impossible to do in those days with the restrictions dictated by the pandemic. The forced distancing and widespread fear had transformed the face of this city. The tourists who usually crowded the streets are few and the city seems almost asleep. And that’s how I started almost as a game to photograph these wonderful creatures that populate the city, the cats.
