Does destroying a cliché leads the loss of the cliché itself?

The project “Definire è limitare. Storie di sei del mattino” develops from this question. The photographic project, made with shots taken over the past 10 years, intends to develop from the concept of repetition: to repeat the same shot, in the same time slot, from the same location, towards the same subject. A repetition that leads to the creation of a collection of hundreds of photographic images with evident elements in common given by the methodology listed above, repeated in each shot, but which differ in some variants such as the weather conditions, the aperture of the focal length and the desire to define or less the subject of the shot, with the intention of delimiting -or limiting- the possibilities of reading the image.

Following this collection of images, the project developed through the creation of a 10×10 square matrix made up of a selection of the previously taken shots, foundation and reference to draw on for the creation of the subsequent photographic compositions. The project, after creating the starting matrix, characterized by shots defined by clichés and repetitions, intends to overcome the static nature of the ordered and stereotyped construction, going to select some of the shots present in the matrix and overlap them with the aim of creating a further picture. A final image in which the definition physical and figurative is lost, obtaining compositions characterized by abstract shapes and shaded colors, and in which the definitions give way to free interpretation.

The cliché of repetition then goes to deconstruct, recomposing itself into images that are characterized by the overlapping of repeated and repetitive shots, but which in their final composition give rise to variable productions not defined by previously standardized parameters and in which the free will -given by the choice of the selection of images to draw on for the final composition- is the predominant factor.

“Definire è limitare. Storie di sei del mattino” is part of the project created in the context of the international workshop VISUALITY_03 Lumen motus movet hominem, Architecture and Design department (dAD), University of Genoa.