The eye inside the eye

Art and science are siblings; both are born from the same lighthouse of imagination. The rise of AI tools pushing artistic boundaries is only the latest chapter of that shared lineage. But there is one invention that undeniably shifted the paradigm of fine arts: photography.

Again, I am not an expert in almost anything. I only speak from my perspective. From there, photography did not replace other disciplines; it freed them. It broke restraints. It opened emotional, perceptual, and imaginative territories that painting alone could not fully reach anymore. Hyperrealism, portraiture, and even impossible landscapes and beings found new life through photography—and later, through its heir: cinematography.

Kuwait, "The Salt of The Earth", Sebastião Salgado, 1991

Paradoxically, one of the most celebrated photographers of our time will likely be remembered by a documentary about his own work. I am speaking of Sebastião Salgado and The Salt of the Earth, directed by Wim Wenders alongside Sebastião’s son, Juliano Ribeiro Salgado. A photograph inside a film about photography—Spiegel der Spiegel: the eye inside the eye.

Photographers understand these quantum leaps intuitively. They know that transitions do not cancel what came before. One step does not invalidate the next; it enriches it. The passage from analog to digital photography, and from photography to cinema, is not a rupture but a continuum.

So let us—artists and scientists alike—allow ourselves to be amazed by the new frontiers we are walking together. Let us explore them without fear. At least, not yet.

The eye inside the eye