About My Family

In the portrait series ‘About My Family’, we see teenagers posing for the camera, intent on telling something about their private lives and their families. The idea for this project stems from my interest in 19th-century scientific and medical photography, which systematically photographed patients suffering from various pathologies, often in standardized poses, with the aim of observing, cataloging, and classifying. The goal was “objective”: the face or body became visual data, elements to be studied to diagnose illnesses or confirm theories.
But while doctors of the time were interested in discovering a symptom, what fascinates me, and what I have tried to give form to with this project, is the discovery of something unseen, moments of transition arising from uncontrolled poses. I wanted to create portraits in which the gaze is not fixed on the camera, the gesture is suspended, the facial expression is incomplete. I purposely transformed the photography session into a psychological one, to see if I could capture the subject’s personality and then present it according to my own criteria of aesthetic selection, but also truthfulness to my intent.
Their expressions are unique, unrepeatable, and imperfect because they arise from emotions and, for this reason, could perhaps escape any form of archiving, whether manual or now algorithmic.