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Lack and Longing is the second chapter in TIME-MAZE, a photographic book made of independent volumes published in a progressive chronology arbitrarily defined by life.
"The opening picture of the first volume 1994-2001 | A BEGINNING is a self-portrait from 1994, it is the first one I ever took. There is a road lined by rows of baby pine trees, newly planted after a big fire. I wanted to confuse the image of myself with that of the trees. I prepared the framing and entered it. We were somewhere around Butte, Montana, USA where I spent a summer working as carpenter’s assistant. I had no consciousness of myself - but a strong desire to have some - and no knowledge of the use of the photographic medium.
For many years I have photographed compulsively almost without looking at the result of my shots. I deeply felt that I wasn't ready to understand what I was doing. I knew what I was trying to do, but it wasn't clear on how to shape it, I wasn't ready to communicate my most intimate work. I was restless (and I still am), moving here and there, photographing everything to find my place and my space: this omnivorous longing didn’t and doesn’t allow me to stop.
I was working on structured projects more consciously and precisely (Nero, Paradiso, Ultimo Domicilio…) but I always kept photographing (mostly in black and white) everything that mattered to me in a constant flux without a specific direction, logic or practical goal.
Despite all this, my every day personal work was still unripe, I tried to put it together and show it in some exhibitions and slideshows without ever getting close to feeling represented by what I was showing. The way I handled my material - that was growing in quantity and complexity - was not precise, not pure enough. I decided to put all that on the side, but kept working on a daily basis out of sheer necessity - without any particular ambition because of my failed expectations.
In the very end of 2011 my best friend suddenly passed away. This event drastically changed my life and my relation with time. There was no more time to waste. After a very tough year I returned to life and finally started to look back at what I had been doing for so many years - but with new eyes and real determination. Some kind of filter that I had in front of my eyes was finally gone.
I understood I needed to grow and have distance to see things because being into something means understand nothing. I have also realised that I have been through specific periods in which I have lived crucial experiences that then brought me in different places. An imaginary map of belonging was finally showing its boundaries.
The passage of time shapes a new alphabet, a new language, and stimulates a revelation: memory emerges, my experience melts with something much wider.
I decided to work on a life book made of progressive chronological volumes. Every volume refers to a specific phase of life, marked by the passing of time, circumstances and personal affairs. Each volume has a subtitle that defines its content more accurately. Each volume opens with a quotation. Each volume has a text insert always shaped differently by my friend and editor Valeria Moreschi based on a conversation we have each time in relation to the time period covered. There is no preconceived rule in terms of length of time of each volume.
The book-designer Eloi Gimeno created the size and graphic shape of the series of volumes starting from the covers which are structured on the concept of time conceived as a line that is not straight but takes the form of a maze.
The graphic design is all conceived in black and white. The idea of this collection of volumes is not that of a diary but a literary autobiography where the past is re-written and re-invented, therefore somehow revealed." - Lorenzo Castore
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