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How I made my second exhibition (and two more were postponed or cancelled due to COVID-19).

Back in 2014 I started a portrait project that took me five years to complete, a task that I felt was achieved only when I reached a high number of decent pictures – high enough for the idea behind the project to be fully expressed. Yet until 2018, the project was only partial: Giuditta Fullone came into it by drawing her own interpretations of the portraits – adding a further meaning to the images. And on January 25th 2020 we made an exhibition in Milan: Silenzio eloquente.

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How I went back to the origins (and tardiness) of analog photography.

Back in September 2017 I bought an Intrepid 4×5 camera, a wood-made modern version of the original view camera – the kind of camera that has been around for more than a century, and that is as simple as it gets: a lens, a base to hold the entire structure and a ground glass where to frame and focus. Many companies still make them (e.g. Toyo, Linhof) and, although developments in technology exploded since the first daguerreotype in the first half of the 19th century, the concept behind them have not changed much.

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How I went to ‘Biennale Cinema 76’ (and woke up at 6AM everyday).

Three years have passed since my first and only visit to ‘Biennale Cinema’ – Venice’s film festival – and this year I finally managed to head back there. Back in may, after I realised that I would have had only a few summer vacation days since I used most of them to go to Japan in Easter, I decided to plan two brief long-weekend trips in August: one in Edinburgh during the Fringe Festival to attend a friend’s play, and another in Venice. I thorougly planned the the movie schedule I would have tried to stick to during my four days in the sultry september weather that plagues the festival every year, in order to get inside the dark venues where movies were screened all day long.

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How I shot pictures (sometimes on request) underwater.

One month ago I had the chance to exchange a lens that I was not using anymore for an underwater camera – the Minolta 35DL – in a camera shop, and I took the deal. I immediately used it a few days later during a pool party that a friend threw in his house on Elba. Before that, I never used an underwater camera – at least that I can remember – and the results enchanted me. Once I got back in Milan I immediately developed the two rolls of film that I shot in such occasion.

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How I walked around Tōkyō (twice) for unusual pictures.

During my latest trip to Japan I decided to make a small photo-project based on infrared pictures of brutalist buildings around Tōkyō. I previously did much research on which buildings to photograph, and Blue Crow’s map really helped me. I ended up drawing a sketch map of the route I would have taken, to understand whether it would have been possible to make it in just one day – also considering that I would have been able to make it only during the first few days in Kyōto, since they were more relaxed. Luckily I managed to plan a round trip around the city starting from outside the Tōkyō station and ending a few train stops from it, and taking the shinkansen back in the evening proved to be easy.

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How I organised (and survived) a group trip to Japan.

This was my fourth trip to Japan. Seven years have passed since my first time there, and photography has always been one of my main drives while travelling there: the way people react to being photographed, they fascination for something that still is ‘unusual’ to my eye. It still is and I kept experimenting with it even during this trip – as I did more and more during each of my previous visits: in 2012 it was with digital, in 2015 it was with film in a rangefinder camera, in 2017 it was with both film in a reflex camera with a flash and instant pictures. This year I decided to try taking both portraits and street photographs on the same camera, in order to capture different perspectives on how people live and behave there, might they be turists or locals. I wanted to be able to show people both as individuals, and as part of the environment they live in and influence with their actions.

“(…) Being able to reach such a mental state doesn’t imply that one has managed to create a masterpiece. Yet, to create a masterpiece one has to know such a mental state.”

Soseki Natsume, “Kusamakura”
(草枕, Grass Pillow)
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How we channeled all the stimuli (and the heat) in the never-ending city of NY.

New York is an immense city. It’s the so-called “city that never sleeps” – and that’s my favorite nickname for it. We went there for a 14-days trip, and that still wasn’t enough. Considering that at the beginning I was planning for only 10 days there, I’m happy that Giuditta convinced me to add more days and that we had the chance to spend the most time possible in such a wonderful and multi-faceted city.

“Over the great bridge, with sunlight through the girders making a constant flicker upon the moving cars, with the city rising up across the river in white heaps and sugar lumps all built with a wish out of non-olfactory money. The city seen for the first time, in its first wild promise of all the mystery and the beauty in the world.” 

F. Scott Fitzgerald, ‘The Great Gatsby’
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How I always end up having more and more pictures (and thoughts) to share.

By developing and printing pictures in the weekends and spare hours at the end of the day, I noticed that more and more extra pictures are piling up – waiting for some recognition. Single pictures that don’t fit into any themed article I share on this blog, but still portray a moment of everyday life – which i mostly spend with a camera around my neck or in my pocket. Some of these pictures even date back years, while others are more recent and just were previously underappreciated and only now noticed.  Since sorting through sleeves of negatives is time consuming – as much as setting up the dark room is – I need to focus on discipline and consistency. And I have to accept that I might not ever be able to print all the pictures I take. Luckily, this thought does not frighten me: I believe that such acceptance of the incomplete power that all of us have over the events of life is an underlying element of any aspect of life itself; accepting the limits of what can be done. Therefore, time management and satisfaction. I have tons of hobbies and interests, and I’m happy even with the little I can get out of any of them. Having at least some pictures to look at, to remind myself of the moment I took that picture – in a visually appealing photograph, giving me the chance to see, or at least imagine, the life of the people portrayed in it –  is enough.

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