On March 17, 2004, an explosive device was activated at the Piloto Public Library in Medellín, where much of the photographic archive of Colombian history is kept. A photograph is the only evidence of this barbarism.

According to estimates around 200,000 people lost their lives in the 50-year Colombian civil war. Another 25,000 were kidnapped, many are still considered missing. When the peace deal between the government and the FARC rebels was made in November 2016, guns were banned from the conflict. But the country's population have since faced the almost impossible task of having to agree on a common past. "The Shape of Now" illuminates this strenuous process and thus Colombia's leaden present from very different perspectives.