The work of Nino Migliori, which has been taking place for 75 years, despite its continuous iconographic transformations, can be analyzed by following well-defined thematic paths that have been traced since the beginning. Among these, for example, figuration and the formless, play and commitment, planning and randomness, apparently in antithesis, on the contrary necessary opposite sides of the same coin.
When asked what his points of reference are, Nino replies “There are three. Chronologically, the first is Lucretius, modern, imaginative, passionate in his own way who challenges tradition because everything is constantly changing; the second is Leonardo, curious about everything that surrounded him, an experimenter to the extreme, always looking for a further goal; the third is Duchamp, non-conformist, determined to break the mould, supporter of the validity and power of designing”.
In particular referring to some verses of Nature, believes that Lucretius had already provided a definition of photography: “Here: to the gaze one thing limits the other so that each limit marks the forms of the world […] There is nothing that closes the whole thing from the outside.” It can be said that these verses anticipate, if I may say so, what Nino maintains on the substance of photography, as he has made explicit through key works such as Antimemoria (1968) e Signification (1978), that is, it is not an objective representation of the world, but a choice that the photographer makes by framing a portion of the real data, therefore a personal interpretation and consequently a lie.
For some years an artistic-emotional-playful relationship has been created between Elisabetta Sgarbi and Nino who, at high frequency, gave life to a chain of mutual inspiration, to a chain of works including the film Nino Migliori. The party that turns the world upside down for fun and the photographic series Nino Migliori’s Carnival. These are rebounds, unexpected deviations, born spontaneously in the space of a moment as a necessary consequence of the dialogue to underline the urgency of the creative vision of both applied to their expressive languages, cinema and photography. Elisabetta tells him that she is collaborating with the Viareggio Carnival, Nino, like an echo, tells her that she would like to photograph the floats, Elisabetta, automatically, replies that then she intends to film it.
So what motivates Nino? The curiosity of following Elisabetta, seeing, understanding an experience never before experienced, being able to satisfy the interest of being a witness and participant in the creation of the floats by entering the laboratories. Thus he moves freely in the Citadel from one atelier to another, talking with the co rutors, asking for the reasons for the topic addressed, asking questions about technical data, about the difficulties encountered, going into the details of the projects, trying to understand the secrets of the trade, to try to identify with the spirit that forged each chariot.
These caves of wonder, where one can strongly perceive the excitement, the tension, the trepidation, the satisfaction and the pride of the master builders a few weeks before the parade, enthuse him. The spirit of competition that animates every race, the drive to improve, the search for perfection even in the smallest detail, the passion that all teams put into their work and the description they make of it, are the common denominator, they are shared traits that lead to awareness that everyone is part of a single plan that is realized in the Masked Course: these are the ideas that will direct the photographic project. It will be the objects, the decorative elements, the symbols, the characters, the details set inside and outside the warehouses, the masks, the pieces already finished, those still to be completed and waiting to be painted that will be photographed with a a fresh, free, at times irreverent look, conditioned by emotion, far from aestheticism and the concept of beautiful photography, to create a collective portrait not so much of the floats and members of the individual teams but of the Carnival.
The work will therefore be a single work Arabesque, Viareggio Carnival. The series is made up of works composed with the collage technique, already used by Migliori in the Seventies, each of which represents the narration of an event, the testimony of an experience. The author takes us on a visual journey that allows us to “participate” in an event whose reading and enjoyment is not linear, hence the title Arabesque understood as extravagance and indeterminacy. The composition does not propose a temporal consequentiality, it offers a free possibility of exploration to the spectator who can proceed, linger, make breaks, return to a detail by lingering his gaze, simply driven by personal interest and aptitude. Specifically, the Viareggio Carnival revolves around the two masks Burlamacco and Ondina immersed in a chaotic pile of clippings.
Why an exhibition of individual photographs? This is the natural consequence of a work carried out for the 150th anniversary of Carnival. Not only because you can appreciate the floats filmed in their entirety during the parade immersed in the twilight-night light which enhances their magic, but above all because the images of the details are a revelation. In some cases it is a peek behind the scenes when the papier-mâché shows its materiality, in others it is the discovery of details that had not been fully appreciated during the show. Furthermore, the exhibition itself is also a countdown entertainment that is proposed to visitors, that is, the search and recognition of the individual objects that formed the collage. Nino could share Calvino’s words: “I think that fun is a serious thing.”
The author is director of the Nino Migliori Foundation
Photo @Nino Migliori
#Viareggio #Carnival #beautiful #photos #Nino #Migliori
– 2024-04-19 10:50:47
