Doing this project was one of the most significant experiences for me, not only as a photographer but also as a person. It wasn't planned, nor did I expect to come across this ritual on a deserted beach. I was on my way to another part of the bay, about 4 km from this spot, where I'd been doing a project for a few months with a gang of youths working on a ship graveyard. During the rainy season, the only access is by bike along the beach at low tide. As I passed by this group, the uniqueness of what I observed made me stop and join the faithful, silently listening to their pastor preach as if I were one of them. During a pause, I introduced myself to the pastor and asked him for permission to shoot the cult, assuring him that I wouldn't publish any images without his express permission. I must confess that his positive response, with a smile on his face, surprised me. But what surprised me even more was the reaction of the worshippers, who immediately accepted me as one of their own and let me shoot them freely from a very short distance. What happened next, which is shown in my documentary, completely changed my view of the world and religion as I can't find a rational explanation for what I experienced that day. Men and women seemed not to see me just a few centimeters in front of them and went into a deep trance after the pastor put his fingers on their foreheads while loudly ordering the evil spirits to leave their bodies. This kind of exorcism culminated in purification, a moment of rare beauty in which the faithful plunged into the sea after a final blessing from the pastor. I'll transcribe what I wrote at the end of the article attached to this documentary: The beach, now empty and silent, witnessed yet another victory for Man in an unrelenting confrontation between good and evil, a battle fought with weapons that no science will ever be able to explain.

Although I have called this series "Purification," this ritual is called the Cult of Liberation because its main objective is to free the faithful from the evil spirits that have settled in their bodies. The liberation culminates in purification, when the faithful immerse themselves in the waters of the ocean and, in this way, the Pastor confirms that they are free. This ritual is always held in a deserted area of the bay, a beach that stretches for 8 km. It does not have a specific periodicity but is carried out at the discretion of the pastor of this church, the United Spiritual Revival Church of Angola. It is important to note that although the Christian religion is dominant in Angola, there is a significant plurality of religions and more than 150 different churches and cults.

Regardless of the subject and circumstances in which I shoot, this is an absolutely essential aspect of my work for several reasons. Firstly, I want to convey messages by faithfully reproducing the way people live and work and evoke feelings and emotions with the stories my photography tells. I can only do this when I enter their world and put myself alongside them, experiencing their daily lives. Understandably, this usually requires an approximation process that can take several months. Secondly, my photography is characterized by a great deal of closeness to my subjects, which also requires that I respect and accept them as if I were one of them. In the specific case of this series, as I said before, it was a chance encounter with this group, and I simply asked the pastor's permission to shoot them and to put myself on the level of anyone who was at the cult as if I were one of them.

As I said earlier, this encounter was purely coincidental.

I can guarantee with complete certainty that none of the people who were present at this cult were in any way performing for the camera and that the ritual was carried out in exactly the same way as it would have been if I hadn't been present. I had the opportunity to publish a documentary about this ritual with a series of 56 photos, and I think that each of these images can attest to the veracity and authenticity of the acts, expressions and atmosphere that I experienced on this day on this beach.

One of my main objectives is undertaking projects with strong narratives like this series. If, in these projects, I can show the reality in which people live and work in a very fragile and sometimes even inhumane way and, with that, send warning messages that can somehow improve their fate, then I have fulfilled my mission as a documentary photographer: to change the world for the better.