Paradoxical

I see a slanted, empty road, and beyond it, the straight horizon line, the calm mountains sunk in mist, and their reflection on the water. A human-made road in contrast with a romantic nature. At a general glance, before focusing on the elements that lie on the border between background and foreground, the photograph’s space forms a familiar and peaceful landscape. But after passing through the overall still layer of the space and observing everything on the slanted line, everything suddenly comes into question. I see those cubic little cabins seemingly exposed to falling into the valley below, and then that crooked sign, at first fearing the calm dog might fall on it, but then I feel I have misread the dimensions and guess that its direction of fall is also towards the valley. Meanwhile, the overall space of the photo, those two tilted signs, and that driverless car make me sense that the tension and danger of collapse is false; as if the scene is staged and nothing is as it seems. I go over all the few elements of the image many times and try to reread their relationships. What is the reality of this scene? A calm landscape seen on the roadside, or a moment in the process of everything on the edge falling into an unseen abyss? This paradox suspends the reality of the scene in this frozen space, and I think what keeps me at this photograph is precisely this issue. That this unique, still moment gives no answer and leaves me unanswered in this equation. I reflect again on the possibilities and limitations of photography. If I saw this scene in a film I would be sure that I was witnessing either a static situation or watching a moment of falling; but the photograph, while saying the elements of this scene are still and balanced, also in another voice warns that this frame might be a capture and freeze of a continuous process of collapse.