Paul Giori: Looking At The Moon Through A Pinhole

"Giori is an artist who works with an immediate, natural and instinctive attitude. He is his own device. He was a wonderful natural artist, a shaman of light, a sensitive man. In a sense, he is a medium himself Rosario scarpato, one of the curators of the exhibition, commented in an interview with 21st century economic reporter.

In the exhibition hall of Beijing sanyingtang Art Center, a strange picture of the moon makes people stop.

The moon in the middle of the picture emits dark blue poetic light, mottled and pure. This wonderful image is one of the works of Paolo gioli's "nature" part. Technically, he chose the most direct means of expression, observing the moon from the pinholes on the aluminum plate. After stripping off the technical characteristics, the image obtained a natural, clear, original, pollution-free and filter image, and removed the deliberate creation of brilliance.

"Giori is an artist who works with an immediate, natural and instinctive attitude. He is his own device. He was a wonderful natural artist, a shaman of light, a sensitive man. In a sense, he is a medium himself Rosario scarpato, one of the curators of the exhibition, commented in an interview with 21st century economic reporter.

Recently, Paul gioli's solo exhibition "anthologies / analogies: films and photographic works (1969-2019)" was opened at the sanyingtang Photography Art Center. The exhibition, by Professor Bruno Di Marino and Lao luoce, is the second domestic exhibition after the first exhibition in China in space 798 of artist care China Art Studio in 2007. This exhibition presents more than 100 Polaroid photography and film works by Paul gioli, which is divided into four parts: nature, body, face and media.

Paul gioli was born in sazano, Rovigo, Italy, on October 12, 1942. In 1976, he moved to Milan and became more interested in photography. Over the years, his photographic works have been recognized by the Italian National Institute of cartography, the Pompidou Center in Paris, and the Arles International Photography Festival.

"I call him" 360 degree artist. ". In fact, his early creation was mainly painting. In the early 1960s, he stopped painting and gradually moved towards film and photography. When we look at zhioli's works, we can find that he used a variety of media in his creation, such as he transferred Polaroid to painting paper and other materials, making the final result very painting. Therefore, zhioli's creation can be seen as a dialogue between photography and painting. " Said Bruno Di Marino, curator and art historian.

Recently, Rosario scarpato, as a joint curator, gave an exclusive interview with 21st century economic reporter and shared his thoughts on governing Orly's light and shadow world.

Paolo gioli, an Italian national treasure artist.   Photo source: Photo by sanyingtang Photography Art Center

Floating face

Throughout zhioli's works, human body, trunk, still life (flowers, leaves) and faces are common themes.

The "natural" part especially shows zhioli's naive feeling, which is also the most "organic" part in zhioli's works. In this series, he tried some very experimental techniques, such as the contact impression method, which directly contacted the leaves and flowers with the negative film and imaged them.

In fact, "face" is also an important theme in zhioli's works. Different from imitating the classical trunk posture, Paul Giori's face of strangers is transformed into masks and simulacrums, trapped on the surface of geometric superposition, accompanied by the interference of bright spots, and finally presented in a painful posture.

"I beautified the faces, made them appear in the original image, illuminated them with spotlights, and highlighted the embellishment of the photos. In freeze frame animation, these images are activated and fused into a floating face Zhioli explains.

Among them, "bullying" series works are very representative, showing a series of faces that seem to be suffering great pain. Here, zhioli also used the means of painting to draw color geometric figures and make light spots in his works. Through the reorganization and splicing between Polaroid, he finally formed the unique and full of personal characteristics of the artist's works.

The alchemy of light and shadow

"The real theme is not what he shoots, such as leaves, faces, bodies, etc., but the way he sets up the scene."

In the curator's view, Giorgio's aesthetic was influenced by two media of the 19th century's pioneer works, when films were not invented. The artist creates a dialogue between still and dynamic images and enlarges or combines the images in a dynamic way, which is similar to the traditional alchemy.

In the use of Polaroid as a flexible means of photography research, Paul gioli broke the conventional paradigm of photography. Zhioli removed the parts of the camera to form a special imaging effect, or transferred the negative film of different sizes to various materials such as painting paper, acrylic, silk cloth, and even reorganized the equipment, modified and removed the parts. In fact, Polaroid has been skeptical of his technology for using instant imaging products because it does not comply with the instructions in the manual. By transferring materials to non film carriers, Giori raised Polaroid to the level of fine arts.

"The work that Giori uses Polaroid to create is actually a kind of photographic painting or painting photography. He may be one of the few people in the world who can create in this way. Maybe the only one. " Lao Luo commented.

21st century: what kind of artist is zhioli in your eyes? How did his early painting experience affect his photographic expression?

Lao Luo: for me, zhioli is a great experimental artist; A real, all-round artist, he uses different equipment to constantly research, never satisfied with the direct effect of these devices, but often innovate the equipment. These devices are his own poetic expression and the real protagonist of his works. I mean not only the machine, but also his processes and techniques (from shooting to developing and printing). As a matter of fact, the painting medium he gave up in 1972-1973 has always existed in his works, that is, photography, silk screen printing, lithography and film. In his artistic practice, we can feel his painting creation techniques in his abstract oil paintings in the 1960s. However, zhioli understood that only relying on the medium of painting would severely limit his research scope. He knew very well that it was still possible to create paintings through film and photography, through the principles of light, emulsion and camera, and through printing technology and other media.

"21st century": many of zhioli's photographic works are created by transferring Polaroid's photos to drawings, combining photography technology and craft processing. What is the difference between this way of creation and tradition?

Lao Luo: zhioli invented several ways to create Polaroid. Before that, no one could work like him. He drew lessons from the works of previous masters of art, but in reality, he is constantly transforming, adding and creating new things. For example, l series (luminescenti Series). He first used a strong light to release light, through the special materials of 3M company, to shoot the human body and statue. Before the light disappears, he transfers it to the Polaroid camera. We can say that his aesthetics is about the use of "transfer", the transfer completed with a variety of technologies.

The 21st century: there is a mottled effect of fragmentation, splicing, fragmentation and obscuration in zhioli's works. This feature is particularly obvious in the face series. The faces of characters are often covered by color fragments, knife like curves, hands or other faces. How do you interpret this expression?

Lao Luo: in fact, zhioli's works can be interpreted in a symbolic way. The artist reviewed the classic iconography, and some of the faces in his work are reminiscent of religious images. Some of his works are called "masks", which reminds people of ancient times. A symbol that repeatedly appears in zhioli's works is that the face and body in his works are often tormented and martyred. In fact, zhioli's works often present a reference to the suffering of saints. By breaking, interrupting and overlapping, he tries to construct a fragmented aesthetics, similar to the crossover and dilution used in film editing. His artistic practice is a dialogue between multiple media: film, photography, painting and image.

The 21st century: media is a way for artists to express themselves, but that's all. Apart from the technical means, what theme do you think Giori is trying to express in his works?

Lao Luo: as I just mentioned, the main character is the equipment. It's not because of technical sophistication, it's like saying, "look how good I'm at inventing technology!" It's a poetic expression. In zhioli, there is a poetic device, or a certain musicality. The real theme is not the one he shot, but the way he sets the scene. This is even more obvious in his film creation. All the important experimental filmmakers made this the center of their films and were able to complete a story. Filmmakers like Ernie Gehr or Michael snow follow this tradition. Through his works, Giorgio actually represents himself.

For example, in the portrait of Hippolyte Bayard on display, zhioli not only wanted to pay tribute to Bayer, but also to express himself. Because he was a martyr, a man misunderstood in art and photography. He doesn't have much resentment or drama, but a little bit ironic. We should see this more and avoid looking only at his restlessness and pain.