Paola Paredes, through photography, investigates new stories that transgress the life of the LGBTIQ+ community. Skin Deep presents fifteen stories, representing the diverse sexualities and gender identities that exist and are present in Ecuador.

This project aims to tear aside perceived stereotypes, and show a community that is ethnically, economically, generationally and emotionally diverse. It rejects the limited definition of gender or sexuality as static or innate. It recognizes both as something fluid, built by each individual throughout their lifetime as they understand and consolidate their own identity.

For this, Paola conducted an important research, which arose from the question "What should I tell?", here Paola established around 20 themes, and was dedicated to interview activists, artists, lawyers working on these issues, and thus, she chose 15 stories that narrate elements of sexual diversity and gender identities, seeking not to focus only on the story that victimizes but highlighting other aspects that are somehow linked to this group, such as empowerment and love. For this reason, the 15 stories are as diverse as their members.

The concept of the name Skin Deep comes from the fact that each participant is telling you their story, sharing their gender identities, or their sexual orientations, and their struggle for their identity, to reclaim it, to discover it, and this struggle implies a process of tearing off their skin and looking Skin Deep.

Paola Paredes Albán is a photographer from Quito, who works with themes related to the LGBTIQ+ community in Ecuador. This exhibition closes a cycle in her work that was marked by three parts, the first her "coming out of the closet", the second an investigation on the hospitals of dis-homosexualization (spaces that pretend to "cure" homosexuality, quite common in Ecuador), and the third Skin Deep.

If you are interested in seeing all the interactive photographs of the exhibition you can find them here, also, if you want to know more about Paola's work, here you can find information about her past exhibitions. Finally, the exhibition is located at the Centro Cultural Metropolitano de Quito.