Arcane - Limited Edition of 6 Photograph

The subject is an anthropized lake though not very often men appear, usually only their signs. A mysterious lake. The works are photographs transferred on wooden boards and afterwards processed with an encaustic of natural waxes and resins. They seem monochromatic and old fashioned works, but once you carefully look at them they are undoubtedly contemporary images. The lake is made up by myriads of tiny drops of water, it is a meaningful representation of the instability of the existence which is only a series of little floating waves, of vibrations, a world of events. The lake is a big body, much bigger than a man but still recognizable by the man. The lake always seems the same but it changes every moment because it is a balance between tributaries and emissaries, rainwater and evaporation. The man is absent or, if ever, he is not the main subject; the works contain the signs left by the man; the anthropization of the lake is a clear presence even if it only consists of a transient trace left in a short time, around and in a lake that existed before and will exist after us, even if the lake itself will have a short life on a geological scale and an infinitesimal one on a cosmic scale. The language used shows a likely vision of the real, not a true one; the reality is apparent, blurred, misty, slightly deformed. The works seem monochromes, under some lights even black and white images, then you discover that they have nuances, green and yellow colors, some diaphanous azure, warm black colors. What is really missing is the pure white, there are only apparent white colors. This is an invitation to the attention. If we do not look very carefully we are incapable of seeing the reality, this implies that we are bound to a misleading retinal vision that prevents us from living the real. The sight itself, the sense we rely upon the most, we use it absently, but we trust it blindly. Is it photography? Is it something else? The starting point is a photographic one, its technical execution is that of a typical pictorial photography: the use of vignetting, the reference to the language of the pinhole photography, the use of a reduced chromatic scale. Yet, the digital interventions, the wood as a base, the color intervention thru the choice and the use of waxes and resins, the structuring of the surfaces with the red-hot irons, lose the indexical value typical of the photography and open to something else. We are on the thin border between the index and the icon. The technique by which these images are realized is quite complex, laborious and slow. The photo, taken in personally significant places and moments, is then processed by digital techniques with a reference to the practice of the pinhole photography. Once the virtual image is ready, it is printed on a flexible basis then the pigments that compose it are removed and transferred on a previously prepared wooden board. Then the image is painted with a sandarac solution and the following step is the encaustic made with beeswax and other waxes and vegetable resins which give additional colors and give structure to the surface. Finally the polishing of the waxes, by hand, in the space of several days. The choice of a slow technique is also a personal condition that encourages the consideration on the short times of our contemporary life when everything is quickly wasted without taking the duty and the pleasure of the slow discovery, of the investigation of ourselves and of what we are able to learn and to do.

Photography:Photo on Wood

Artist Produced Limited Edition of:6

Size:15.7 W x 12.6 H x 0.8 D in

Delivery Time:Typically 5-7 business days for domestic shipments, 10-14 business days for international shipments.