L.City

Materials are instrumental to my art practice, especially the photographic material. For the exhibition I presented four framed panels with some of the original artwork from my 16mm film L.City. The film, an archive of love memories that unfolds along the lines of a poem, is created with thousands of black and white paper cutouts, and collaged photocopies inspired by iconic photography of the last century, animated with various techniques directly under a Oxberry16mm camera with the help of a self-built multiplane structure. Three of the panels in the show have photocopies and paper cutouts layered similarly to the way they were originally shot, although compressed in a smaller space and with shorter distance in-between the layers.
The fourth panel has some of artwork used in a scene depicting people walking at street level, with the point of view lower on the ground. The legs were first digitally cut out from one single photo, then re-drawn to simulate all the key poses of a walk, then printed on paper again. Several pairs of legs were taped on punched paper, to allow registration with a pegbar.

Usually, in my creative process I alternate strong and emotional intuitions with a methodical and meticulous technical research. Materials, aesthetic, and the process are tailored to each project. My practice is both intuitive and methodical, artisanal, and complex. My excitement comes from the attempt to create motion from still images and the process is often a layered one. My animations oscillate between narrative and the sublime, becoming a blend of quasi-realism, idealized fantasy, and intimate nostalgia.
Materials are instrumental to my art practice, especially the photographic material. It is often a carrier of memories (of places, lived experiences, feelings, etc.), as well as it is the source of technical experimentation. I tend to be inspired by something tactile, and often begin by collecting and dismantling found footage and imagery. I manipulate these materials, for example dissecting and re-collaging images or adding colors and graphics on original stills, and I combine them with newly created drawings, objects, or multiple passes in the camera.
Animation for me is the ultimate art. It is truly interdisciplinary, it’s a vehicle for setting other arts in motion, it’s transformative, continuously expanding into new forms, evolving through technology, and at its core it is pure magic!