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HomeContentsOnline exhibitions > Stefano Nicolini: Swimming Pool (Piscine)

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Stefano Nicolini 
Automatons 1 
[Swimming Pools (Piscine)] 
2009 
  
Colour slide 35 mm, printed on Hahnemuehle Baryta paper 
70 x 179 cm 
  
Provided by the artist - Stefano Nicolini 
 
LL/37496 
  
Automi 1 [Automatons 1] seals more than any others the inevitable as much as irrational challenge we create with ourselves and the world becoming automatons, humanoids, unthinking beings. The athlete in the right foreground seems totally dismembered of his muscles and soul. His shoulder above the water looks like the tilted dorsal fin of a ravenous shark chasing its prey. This is the first of a group of photos in Piscine [Swimming pools] which curiously contain anatomical details referable to whales and sharks, which for about fifteen years were my preferential subjects. It is almost as if through Piscine I am sanctioning the continuation of my work.
 
The swimmer in the foreground has his head slightly under the surface of the water. This makes it impossible for him to hear and realize that the athlete facing him two lanes above is he himself still partially human, as revealed by the more rounded lines of his bust and by the last sketching of a glance through his goggles. This is the only subject in the Automi [Automatons] series with some kind of expressiveness of the look. The two protagonists of this mirrored part of the photo are concentrated on challenging each other and therefore on themselves. Thus they do not seem to realize that the bodies preceding them, respectively in the lane separating them and in the one above, are dematerialized. These two almost dissolved bodies represent the destiny which attends those who proceed unthinkingly in a challenge devoid of ideals with themselves and the world: disintegration. Man has not yet learned how to live with himself, let alone with the world. He still has a long way to go, as emphasized by the position of the two swimmers-automatons on the far right of the image, and by the format of the photograph. In fact, the lengthening of the photo "increases the distance" towards the finishing line making it still seem far away, and for this reason not included in the image. However, after a wild proceeding in turbulent waters, the far left corner of the photo offers an optimism ahead owing to a last segment of inviting calm turquoise waters ahead.
 
As in all of the photographs in this first series, Automi [Automatons], there is no background. The protagonists are isolated from all spectators and natural elements which instead are present in other photographs in Piscine. This stylistic choice, confining the protagonists in a cold and silent beauty reduced to pure aesthetic, condemns all acts preformed with no soul and no ideals. It also relegates them in a timeless dimension so as to cut off, as much as possible, all negative influence on the sound part of society, which will be represented by the thinking man embodied in the divers.
 
Stefano Nicolini (July 2010) 
 
 
  
 
  
Title • Introduction • First image • Lightbox • Checklist • PhVPrevious Previous Previous[1 of 30]
 
 
 
  
 
  
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