Images with soul
Cristina Petrelli
"It's like wandering in a world without mirrors, asking every person you meet to describe you and everybody repeats incessantly : " you have a face just as I have, and your eyes are bluer and large , "and even " my smile when I look at you, " but you do not believe it until one day you hit a stone wall and no one hears you say " ouch " , and the whole problem is solved ." The act of Diane Arbus is pervaded by the intention to make it a reality faithful to the truth that the idea of R03;R03;a world without mirrors somehow expresses , as it may seem paradoxical . Of course the boundaries are blurred and would rely on the language would provide very few certainties. Alessandra Baldoni reflects this dynamic relationship , allowing the imagination to fit into the space between the subject and its description. In Lives of illustrious men , the artist is limited to trigger this process by sending a photo and asking you to tell it. As a grandmother , leafing through the family album , pauses to comment on the various photographs in the same way , the word in the form of writing is accompanied by animating the image .
Far from that mass technology as we know it today, here is the picture of the early twentieth century, black and white , on film and with the subject posed . Features that suggest that the role of these photographs , in marking the life of the people portrayed in immortalizing the most significant moments , it was important enough to be assigned a ritual value .
Found mostly in local markets and stalls , the photos used in this project lack a certain origin . Having lost the reference context gets to change the status of those images which, by constituents a lasting memory , pass to be mere fragments . A condition that allows the simultaneous operation inspire alienating.
Alessandra Baldoni studies the shots of the century and it repeats the same subjects . Pay attention to the details ( hairstyles , clothes , settings ) , restores the analogue and goes so far as to age the paper making pictures in style . This would be true false history were it not for the presence of particular that , for an eye , make it possible to unmask the author . Clues that the artist likes to disseminate in his own photographs intriguing and provoking the viewer . An attitude that shows the intention of the choral project that has the involvement of the other ( spectator- narrator ) a substantive aspect . In this set there is also the artist who , far from occupying a prominent position does is light the spark and trigger a reaction. The fact that we can not know if the photo you receive is old or alleged makes the ambiguous relationship between the image and the word . The criterion of truthfulness traditionally assigned to the photograph it cracks and the image takes on a role mainly instrumental . At the same time the structure fictional , that the basis of the literature , dissolves slightly in promoting the understanding of the writing that is beaten to the computer. Issues highlighted by the decision to give a common format to the texts by placing them in a box and white different to the photos presented in frames different from each other . The articulation through the diptych suggests instead the reciprocity between the two languages R03;R03;. Silent guardian of existences, the snapshot preserves the ability to witness the reality of identity . The people we see in the image frozen can benefit from the use of the word only to come back to life . The writing becomes the vehicle of emotions that such an operation causes . The image is transformed into a track which bring forth creative stories. Stories from the magic paths to save from oblivion who appears in the photo. The faces rendered anonymous by the lack of context and time spent keeping with their presence into the card , all the uniqueness of a life lived . "Little biographies - writes the artist - which take their inspiration from the pictures, imagining the moment immortalized , the background , the same day. He comes to make a diary of plausible existences in which the literary biography reveals its essence , that being creative inevitably operation that defines Winterson : ' art and lies . " A set of stories where the protagonists are perfect strangers who have not changed the course of history with their actions . Characters that are the reason for his life in a series of personal events , introspective , sentimental confessions that go to outline a parallel with the chapters of the novel by Giuseppe Pontiggia "Lives of illustrious men " from which the project takes its name. A title that deliberately approaches , by contrast to those of literary and pictorial series dedicated to illustrious men that spread from the middle of the fifteenth century. Humanism influence a vision of the world where man is put in the center of the universe and becomes the protagonist of the story through his own exploits memorable . The parable of the twentieth century, to which the Vanguards have provided an eloquent voice , he completely reversed this view . Each life becomes worth living and every person to be remembered for their personal victories and defeats, for the weaknesses and desires , for the sufferings and joys, snatching from each a little ' us. Writing is a creative process of this analysis that leaves out a bit ' author in every text and , at the same time , allows the reader to find himself in his words . In this way each song was autobiographical , and in this context include the words of Anna Maria Ortese : " To write is to look calm, and sometimes find it. You go home. The same as read. Who writes and reads really , that is only for himself , comes home , he's fine. Who does not write or never reads, or only on command - for practical reasons - it is always outside the home, even if he has many . It is a poor man , and it makes life poorer . " The draw from their personal baggage returns the memory to its dynamic dimension where the subject inevitably influences the story . The biographies creative juxtaposed with photographs trigger a game of reflexes where our face , like that of the narrator , is superimposed on one of the photo and imagination creeps offering a subjective description that makes reality more mobile and on , just as if we were in a world without mirrors.
