Stefano Nicolini
2009
Vital Exclamations
[Swimming Pools (Piscine)]

Colour slide 35 mm, printed on Hahnemuehle Baryta paper
70 x 104 cm
 
Provided by the artist - Stefano Nicolini
This is one of my favourite photographs in Piscine [Swimming pools]. Eight pairs of legs of a synchronized swimming team, engaged in a repeated vertical apnea, fill the photographic rectangle with a harmony which emphasizes the elegance of the athletic act. They look like just as many exclamation marks to which the vertical movement sealed by their shaded extremities gives a cheerful vitality. After so many photographs in Piscine dominated by hypnotizing chromatisms, in this case the hypnotizing effect is given by the movement.
 
The bright turquoise of the swimming pool invites us to follow the swimmers in their prolonged apnea within the natural element, in their vital exclamations. The repeated contact with the water and the grace which it is characterized by represent the fourth step in Piscine.
 
Stefano Nicolini (July 2010)
 
LL/37497