In Chile, there are around 3,500 women deprived of liberty, placing the country as the third in South America with the highest number of female prisoners. Cautivas is a series of portraits gathered over more than three years at the Santiago Women’s Penitentiary Center (CPF). We see the faces of different incarcerated women who agreed to tell their stories through the image.

Some wider shots reveal details of clothing, scars, and tattoos, which serve as an invitation from the author to delve into each personal story. Each portrait embodies, in a literal or metaphorical way, an interior and an exterior. They speak of survival, the sustenance of their families, self-defense, and more.

The specific reasons seem irrelevant when appreciating this series about life in suspension and the need, as a society, to confront these stories with empathy, and to understand the dignity of the body, the face, and the human condition through these individuals—beyond moral scrutiny.