The Pardinyes neighborhood in Lleida was the setting for the author's first fifteen years. The family home, located on Pardinyes Baixes street, near the natural area that would later become La Mitjana, was a place full of life, with a garden, a chicken coop, and rabbits, right by the Segre river.
The move to Bonaire street marked a significant change in his relationship with his surroundings. The proximity to La Mitjana and the water gates was left behind, becoming a space of memories, both pleasant and painful. It was there he learned to swim and experienced events that profoundly marked him.
“"My father, attentive, saved our lives by grabbing us in one swoop."
Among the saddest memories is the drowning of a friend at the water gates shortly after their first communion, an event that marked his first close encounter with death. He also vividly recalls the first waste spill from the Impacsa paper mill in Balaguer, which left the river covered in foam and dead fish.
The water gates were a territory of adventure throughout the year, where fishing, swimming, and even climbing the hydraulic structures took place. This idyllic period ended with the move to Lleida city, although photography, his new passion, brought him back to this place years later.
The 2008 crisis allowed the author to regain expressive freedom in photography. On December 3, 2013, he returned to the water gates to take a series of nocturnal shots, capturing the melancholy and gratitude towards this significant space in his life.
Regrettably, some emblematic places from his childhood in that area, such as the Sant Jeroni fountain or the Mauri bar, no longer exist, but the memories, especially those related to the brass work at La Lamparería, endure.
