Milo Vidal is a Belgium-based photographer specializing in portraiture. Their artistic project Karma Coma is a space of coexistence of photography and poetry.

“The place where […] photography becomes a form of handwriting, and poetry turns into something you can look at. […] This project is about staying human in a world that rewards masks.”

The portraits that Vidal captures are the essence of acknowledgment. The camera points directly at the subject, and the subject looks straight into the lens. There is no disturbance in this pathway; it is stripped of performance and built on willful gaze.

“Every photograph is a reply to a question someone didn’t know how to ask,” the artist says. The photos offer plenty of space for storytelling, yet they can be taken at face value, without minimizing their impact.

Vidal expresses that one of the most important qualities of photography (and art in general) is sincerity, “art that breathes, stumbles, and questions.” This quality can clearly, and without a forced look beyond the veil, be interpreted through their portraiture. Candid and beautifully curated shots of people in all stages of life or grief are what make the artist’s collection noticeable and special.

Vidal skillfully blurs the line between monochromatic shots, coherent juxtapositions, and flimsy conceptual editorial takes. These intended and at times unexpected combinations blend harmoniously, with the expected result successfully delivered—that of capturing and evoking “a simple truth,” as they call it—that “authenticity is more beautiful than perfection.”