Edge (2014)

 

(On the Outskirts of Lisbon) 

 

The work shown here is only part of a set of dozens of images that have been gathered during one year approximately. In it I try to reflect on the surroundings, the boundary of the big cities (Lisbon, in this case) and how it can be more revealing of the true identity of a population. At the same time, I explore and affirm the validity of photographing in virtual spaces. 

 

These images could not have been achieved conventionally. They were not taken treading the floor of the city or its surroundings, feeling the heat or cold of the street, the wind in my face. There was no smell or sound. No risk. There was, instead, a total immersion in virtual reality provided by Google Street View, a website that provides images in almost 360 ° and almost worldwide. There was a visual quest, a search, and a decision. 

 

These images are excisions, surgical cuts, from a vast virtual universe. Devoid of any gesture or artistic intent, Google Street View is, nonetheless, a visual space, and therefore, worth photographing. Through my wandering and subsequent choice, I tried to generate a set of images (in which I hope a human presence will be felt) and reflecting the issues I mentioned. In a definitely playful and almost obsessive attitude, there is a huge desire to find images that would otherwise be lost in the aesthetic uselessness of the tool. Images that, despite their existence, would never be regarded as an artistic object. My work was thus to look at them and detach them from their original media, giving them a new life and function, while, at the same time, enjoying some of the idiosyncrasies of the images collected by the camera in Google and all its errors and 'accidents', to provide an alternative reading of space, in contrast to the traditional idea of ​​street photography.