Hyper-realism

 

Built to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the series of Guido Castagnoli interprets the 9 places where the evening of 9 November 1989 were first opened the gates. «The thing that struck more of this research is how the city is still carrying on its surface (and not only) the deep scars of a painful past, alas not so far away!» writes us in a note that tells of his way to portray reality. «Photography for me is basically trying to talk about my personal way of feeling the world yet (and this is the most interesting thing) with one more chance: to speak of ourselves through the description of a world that is completely outside us. And it is here that the process is enriched. It is through this two-way exchange. A sort of emotional loop. The place itself someway contains, or better, reflects an emotion that already belongs to my emotional baggage that is enhanced and modified over time in tandem with the real life not necessarily related solely to the photographic experience. I discovered after several experiments with other formats that the shooting on film in large format is the ideal way to develop this creative process. The prints made from a plate 8×10 have a quality and clarity that I feel better coincide with the attempt of a photo-realistic representation of reality. The sharpness and the amount of details thus reach not simply to satisfy a sterile aesthetic appetite but rather as a language choice. I like to describe this feeling of “presence” with the word “Hyper-photographic realism”. I use a Japanese camera type folding in cherry wood. The lens I prefer is the 300 mm that considered the format is roughly equivalent to 40 mm on the Leica format. The films I like best are the negatives of Kodak’s series Portra. The prints are made with plottering Epson’s pigment after a process of hugh-resolution scanning and a subsequent color correction in Photoshop.»

 

 

Photo:

© Guido Castagnoli: from the series "Berlin 2009". Courtesy of Sasha Wolf Gallery, New York City.

www.guidocastagnoli.com

(click on the image at right for more pictures)