Gradi di Empatia
inkjet print, cm 80 x 60
2020
“Gradi di empatia (Degrees of empathy) stemmed from the artist’s desire to pay symbolic homage to photography and printing techniques. The artist started by examining the Mario Fantin and Lino Marini archives and selecting several large-format photographic prints (38 x 47 cm) from the production portraying Mont Blanc and performed an action that would blur part of the picture. Unlike works created in the past using a similar practice, however, in this case the artist used photographs that were not her own to achieve a different photographic image that includes both the landscape fixed by the other person’s gaze and the result of her body movements. The initial intent of her action was not to destroy the image but to simulate the movement of dark-room masking – a technique that corrects or modifies an image to produce a different result from that of the print process. The movement of the artist’s body – which also invades the edges and margins of the image underscoring its nature as a single and unrepeatable action – declares a doubling of the time and space. Entering into a conflictual relationship with the sedimented vision of these documents, Pugno overtly re-appropriated the image which – via the act of masking – was selectively resignified and freed”.
Copyright © 2022 - Laura Pugno