Mañana Mañana from photographer Tessa Ruger asks us to reconsider our relationship with time

The journey of Amsterdam-based photographer and visual artist Tessa Ruger doesn’t start quite where you’d expect. A completely self-taught photographer, Tessa originally studied Fashion and Branding at the Amsterdam Fashion Institute before forging her own way into this entirely different medium. At first, Tessa used her camera to focus on the fashion industry as a “natural extension” of her studies, before turning to a more tender, documentary style in 2023, she tells It’s Nice That. For the past two years, she’s been dedicating herself to her personal professional practice, kicking things off with Mañana Mañana, her first long-term project depicting Spain’s autonomous Andalusia community.

With her thoughtful perspective on documentation, Tessa’s approach straddles style and genre, albeit with one core focus: time and fluidity. “Through the medium of photography, I investigate how different temporalities shape identity and belonging, reflecting on the tensions between slowing down and urgency, tradition and modernity, local resilience and global pressures,” Tessa says. It’s this sentiment and subject matter that is delicately explored across Mañana Mañana. “The idea for Mañana Mañana first emerged from my experience of navigating between two distinct perceptions of time,” Tessa recalls, those being the uber-efficient, rapid pace of Northwestern Europe compared to Andalusia’s slower, more cyclical rhythm.

Tessa has spent a lot of time in Andalusia since childhood, and it’s the place she identifies as “where I became fascinated by how time is experienced differently”. The contrast between the autonomous community and her day-to-day home life in Amsterdam only became more pronounced when she began her career. “The project took shape after two years of burnout, a period in which I struggled within a system that leaves little room for slowing down,” Tessa notes, “having grown up in a society where speed and efficiency take precedence, I felt the need to explore alternatives.”

Tessa’s process for Mañana Mañana holds true to its subject matter. Photographed over the course of six weeks, Tessa travelled by public transport to 15 different locations across the community, exploring the moments in between movements, transitions and actions. “With my analogue medium format camera in hand, I covered countless miles, allowing myself to be guided by instinct and curiosity,” she says. “These are the instances that require stillness, a heightened sense of awareness and a deep presence.” Over the project, Tessa began to find those moments of mindful inaction to be the ultimate rhythm she sought to bottle across the series. “The project is still very much in progress, and I foresee continuing to develop it,” Tessa reflects. After all, documentation of slowing down can’t (and shouldn’t) be rushed. “I believe the concept of time demands deep, ongoing exploration,” she adds.

“At its core, Mañana Mañana poses a question,” Tessa says. “In a world where slowing down is increasingly seen as a luxury, what do we lose when we abandon unhurried time, and what might we regain by reclaiming it?” As such, throughout her whole practice and Mañana Mañana individually, Tessa seeks to reconsider the personal relationships we have with time. “I want to recognise the value in pausing,” Tessa ends, “stepping back and hopefully reconnecting with a more mindful and meaningful pace of life.”