Juno

cute movie...
and this shot,
totally sweet ;)

more cathedrals

a couple of awkward combinations i found once driving through germany...


too bad the "real" photos didn't come out :(

too shy to try

yesterday i was walking along the thames south bank, crowded with every sort of people. the weather was great. not london-great, really great. and as i was looking around and visually exploring all different facets of humanity, i found the perfect shot. the perfect guy and the perfect shot. well, not in absolute terms. i mean, for sure it wouldn't have been the best photo of the year, not even of the week or day or hour, but still for my standards... it was the perfect shot.

take out my camera, start playing with the settings, don't even need to frame - it was already the perfect shot. but i take too long. i always take too long. what can i say, i'm just a beginner. too long. enough for him to spot me. to notice something's going on, even though i'm kind of behind him. still he stays there, but looks weird, moves his book. and there it is. PANIC.

i panicked. as i always do when i feel i'm intruding. a theatre director once told me i seem to walk through the world without wanting to bother a single human being. never thought about that before, but kind of makes sense. i don't like to impose my presence. pathologically shy. and with a camera, that's pretty difficult. especially when your favourite subject are people. and you end up shooting at buildings, landscapes, everything but people. because you're shy.

so that's what happened. he noticed. surely didn't come there and ripped my camera off insulting me. he just (looked like he) noticed. and i panicked. and backed away. didn't shoot. walked a few steps away, standing by the river, waiting for time to go by. basically waiting for him to leave his bench. waiting for the perfect shot to dissolve, and for regret to settle in.

regret. regret i didn't shoot. regret i'm freaking shy. regret that in the end, i won't have the perfect photo. probably it wouldn't have come out the way i saw it, i'm not half that good. but still. i could have had it, and checked how bad it would have come. upset and disappointed, i start walking again. after all i was heading to tate modern.

and funnily enough, besides the dada exhibit i was expecting to find, a new one just opened a couple of days ago...
Street & Studio - An Urban History of Photography
hahaha

amazing. well, not everything, but most of the stuff. simply amazing. a collection of pictures from the end of XIX century to present day. i have to admit that, clearly, i didn't find (most of) the studio pictures extremely exciting. but the street ones... awesome. a photography class couldn't teach you more.

or serve as inspiration. just an hour ago i had panicked while intruding into someone else's day. hanging on the walls, i was now acknowledging hundreds of intrusions. intrusions telling stories, narrating bits of history. history from people's point of view. street history.

now, i'm not that ambitious. being shy, can't possibly have ambitions. but not only for ambition, even just for fun, shyness isn't a light load to carry around. should properly dispose of it one of these days. at least some of it.

here's not my favourite picture of the exhibit, but the comment... pretty much what i needed to read:
"Far off, amongst the walkers, she stands out like a golden pheasant in a hen house. She approaches... I'm shy, trembling a little. Twenty meters... ten meters... eight... six... and click! The shutter of my big camera makes so much noise that the lady jumps almost as much as I do. It doesn't matter a bit, except to the man with a loud voice accompanying her who, with a furious look, starts to get hold of me... What does it matter, though, all that counts is the pleasure of having a new photo."

J. H. Lartigue
photographing ladies at Bois de Boulogne, 1910 or so...

I may be paranoid (but not an android)

radiohead touring these days...
and, ironically, in the next few months i'm not going to any single city they're not touring in. just bad timing, each time. damn!

want to be there...
badly...

london reflections

have been thinking a lot lately. walking around london. and thinking. clearly didn't come out with any useful thought, but still. have been thinking.


sometimes looking at things from a different perspective helps. defocus. maybe you see that things are not so bad after all, and stop whining. maybe not, but still you've gained a different frame. which helps. sometimes.
like looking in the opposite direction when you're crossing the street. surely helps. at least i'd stop bumping into cars.


many things are pretty different here. not only because they drive on the wrong side of the road. a lot different. better?? huh, dunno. different, for sure. just wondering whether it looks appealing just because it's different...


appealing... big word. plus not entirely true.
would i see me here? maybe. but doing what... would i see me here with astrophysics? mmm tough call. probably more than how i see me doing it now. but is it enough? can't really change things just by changing places. at the end of the day, nothing has changed, after all.


curiosity. that one i have, for sure. but curiosity mixed to fear is not the best cocktail. guess i'm curious to see what could happen if i were doing something else. if i were a different person. but it's probably too late for that.


and it's probably too late to be thinking about that.
too late.
time to sleep.

voices from a different time

recently this song came into my mind. a couple of days before i came to london. couldn't avoid thinking about stuff like the first scene of blow up. not that i was expecting to find anything like that nowadays...


but still, couldn't take it off my mind. and somehow drifted me to this song, and the way Baricco reviewed it:

"After all, it's just a record. But still. You put it on and you feel an old man's voice coming from far away, one of those old men who stand and it's a miracle, kept upright by the long coat and the smell of mothballs. The old man's singing. With a tiny voice, quietly, but in tune, and sweet, somehow you sympathise with those trembling high pitch notes. In them you feel all the teeth he's got no more, shortness of breath, arthritis and everything else. There's nothing more: just his voice, singing without pause the same refrain, peaceful, melancholic here and there. No background music. Some noise, voices from far away. You don't understand a word. Not because it's English. With no teeth, at his age, words become ghosts. Sounds. What a damn record is this?

It's currently [note: 1995] in the British top hit. And it has a weird story. In 1971, a musician named Gavin Bryars starts recording the voices of the homeless living in Waterloo station, London, for the soundtrack of a documentary. He records every kind of stuff. Then, one day he meets this old man. Homeless as well. He hears him singing. He records his voice and takes it back home. Listens to it again. And he's like hypnotized. The refrain comes from a religious song (Jesus' blood never failed me yet) and he finds out it's like a ring: you can repeat it at infinity, it's a neverending lullaby. He works on it for years. A first record appears, a cult for very few people, then he starts working on it again, and after 10 years this cd comes out: 75 minutes where the homeless guy sings with no pause the 25 seconds of his reprise. You may think it's fool, but that's just because you haven't heard it yet.

After a couple of minutes you feel a string orchestra coming along, slowly, behind the old man's shoulders, and taking over on his voice, wrapping it into a blanket, so to speak, and carrying it around. The voice's always the same, but it starts sounding different. It's getting warmer, slightly, you don't even realise it and there's a harp and bells, and a choir, and drums, a flute, two clarinets, an oboe, and trumpets, trombones (but gently, in order not to smash anything), even an organ, some kind of gong and who knows what else. The voice of the homeless guy is still embroidering its lullaby, but it's now become a sacred relic to be carried in procession, a tiny little bone of the saint, watching right at you from the top of an opulent procession: it slowly oscillates, and goes, along the streets of your mind.

It would have already been enough now - you can feel it - that music has tricked you. But it's not over. At some point, during the big procession, another voice comes out, sounding like it's amplified by a megaphone, it's getting closer, and then you recognise it, it would be impossible otherwise: Tom Waits. Who else? Tom Waits - for those few who don't know it - is a guy who sings and in his voice there are all the drunken homeless voices of the world. It's not a voice, it's a public dumping ground, it's a years long cigarette, millions of beers and miles, hundreds of loves and motels. It's one of the most exciting voices you have ever heard. And now it's coming there, duetting with that old man who's dead by now, but it doesn't matter, because his voice never stopped, both of them swinging on that eternal refrain. Tom Waits. And the old drunken man. Sons of a drunken God. It looks like they haven't done anything else in life. Just sing along, all the time. And drink beers, of course.

All in all the procession goes away, as it arrived it's leaving, fading out inside the stereo, leaving behind itself a few violins hung on very high pitch notes, and pieces of Tom Waits, shooting notes as if they're teasing the world. The drunken guy has already disappeared. And you're wondering about his name, and when he died, and where and how. And whether he knew other songs like this one."

A.Baricco, Figli di un Dio ubriaco, Barnum

london calling

previously it was a mixture of fear and other feelings. wondering why i'm doing that, why i'm going there, what i'm looking for... fear was constantly there, but still not strong enough. the motivation i hoped an external challenge would bring was weak & confused, if ever there. thus making everything v. difficult.
but i guess now it's just a matter of time, so every other feeling gently withdrew. only fear left. sometimes fear is good. let's see how the story goes this time.
no time to wonder why...

biutiful cauntri - reprise

here's the third reprise. kind of makes me happy. this feeling of continuity. of following the bits of a story through its development. makes me feel like a teeny tiny wannabe journalist...
whatever.

a while ago i found out a doc movie had been produced in italy about the garbage emergency in my region, and i was kind of excited. (see december and january posts) because there is lots to say about that, lots of stories to be collected and let free. lots of stories that need to be heard by many more ears.
tricky business. you need the right story, you need to tell it in the right way. from the promo it sounded like that was the case. it sounded promising.
then the limited distribution and me being in germany most of the time... in the end i did not watch it. now i found out it just came out as a book+dvd.

but does not really matter. a couple of friends of mine watched it, and had a bad impression. and i trust them. i mean, i know enrica might be overcritical from time to time, and i still believe that maybe it could say something new to the average italian living far far away from our garbage. but i haven't seen it, and she has. and she believes it does say very few (if not anything), not as piece of information, nor as story-telling movie.
makes me kind of sad, because it was a good chance. still want to watch it, sometime.

here's enrica's complete review - in italian - hopefully i have more time and translate it soon...

Biutiful cauntri
Regia: Esmeralda Calabria, Andrea D’Ambrosio e Peppe Ruggiero.
Genere: documentario
Italia 2007
Durata: 83’

Il film-documentario di Esmeralda Calabria, Andrea D’Ambrosio e Peppe Ruggiero racconta la cattiva amministrazione di un territorio, in cui alcune zone, nel caso specifico si parla del casertano, sono sfruttate dalla camorra per depositare rifiuti tossici che provengono dalle regioni industrializzate del Nord Italia. Alle discariche abusive, poi, si aggiungono quelle registrate, ma che risultano non essere a norma e aziende che operano senza avere i giusti sistemi di sicurezza, provocando danni ambientali che si è riusciti a far passare sotto silenzio nel corso degli anni. Intanto, in questa stessa zona, le pecore si ammalano e muoiono a causa della diossina, la produzione di latticini è bloccata, lasciando gli allevatori in un mare di debiti, e la frutta, che poi arriverà sulle nostre tavole, appare micragnosa e avvolta da una patina grigiastra.

Il film, dopo mesi dal premio vinto a Torino, ha trovato finalmente una distribuzione arrivando nelle sale di non poche città italiane. Già un buon risultato per essere un documentario e soprattutto un documentario italiano. Ma c'è da chiedersi se un film sulla situazione campana avrebbe incontrato lo stesso l'interesse dei distributori qualche anno fa, quando si sarebbe potuto davvero sollevare il problema a livello nazionale, prima che l'immondizia sommergesse le nostre strade e quando non era ancora certo il successo economico dell'operazione. E poi cosa bisogna pensare quando ci si accorge che basta affrontare una tematica sociale di estrema attualità per poter vincere un premio, senza considerare la reale bontà del prodotto?
Certo l'approccio che è stato scelto dagli autori di Biutiful cauntri è tra i più difficili: raccontare una questione complessa non con uno stile da reportage, ma attraverso una struttura narrativa che si fonda sulla presenza di personaggi, i quali agiscono nel loro ambiente seguiti dall'occhio che ce li mostra, evitando la classica intervista. Ma siamo sicuri che sia stata la scelta giusta rispetto ai fini che gli autori si proponevano?

A mio avviso, il film non racconta nulla di nuovo e ammettendo, invece, che ci sia qualcosa che la maggior parte delle persone ancora non sa (chi scrive è campana), c'è da dire che per denunciare quello che si propone basta anche meno di un'ora, mentre il film dura ben ottantatre minuti. Dov'è la storia? Un film che ha questa durata e l'approccio narrativo accennato sopra, deve avere una storia e svilupparla seguendo un filo rosso che ci conduca dall'inizio alla fine, mentre sembra che in questo caso non ci sia. Ci si perde invece, in tutta una serie di scene che non fanno altro che raccontarci sempre la stessa cosa. I personaggi che ci sono presentati sono scelti bene, un ambientalista incazzato che opera sul territorio da parecchi anni, una famiglia di allevatori che vede morire le sue pecore giorno dopo giorno e un paio di contadini che hanno visto sorgere industrie con i loro sversatoi accanto ai loro campi, eppure il film non riesce ad andare (o forse semplicemente non vuole) oltre il già noto.
L'unica scena che affronta con un occhio più profondo il problema è quella iniziale, in cui si vede l'ambientalista scontrarsi con i guardiani di una discarica, i quali pur di non perdere il posto di lavoro mettono a rischio la loro vita e quella della comunità che li circonda, tacendo tutta una serie di irregolarità, dimostrando che in Campania lo scontro non è semplicemente tra la società civile e uno Stato assente o, tra lo Stato e la criminalità organizzata, ma permea l'intero tessuto sociale. Il problema è legato al retaggio socioeconomico, storico e culturale di una regione del Mezzogiorno, che mantiene, da sempre, ognuno di noi attento solo a quello che succede a se stesso o al prossimo più vicino di turno con il quale condivide un problema impellente.

Eccetto questa scena, l'ambientalista non si scontra più con questa realtà, ma incappa infinite volte, come se non lo avessimo mai visto, in cumuli di immondizia sversati dove capita, purché la zona sia isolata e di passaggio e non smette di sbraitare fino alla fine del film mostrandoci solo la punta dell'iceberg. Se questo, però, fosse un modo per sottolineare che la lotta tra il singolo e un intero sistema che non funziona è impari, allora a mio avviso è raccontato male a livello filmico. Infatti, non c'è nulla che faccia percepire questo reiterarsi di scene simili tra di loro come la costruzione di un significato ben preciso. Inoltre, se attraverso questo personaggio si voleva raccontare semplicemente questo, cosa esprime di diverso dalla figura dell'allevatore? Non sarebbe stato meglio mantenere il suo personaggio allo stesso livello dei contadini, che rappresentano un corollario rispetto alla narrazione principale, lasciando definire la struttura narrativa del film dalla storia della famiglia di allevatori, che dal punto di vista drammaturgico sembra essere l'unica a stare in piedi? Il pecoraio vede morire le sue pecore un giorno dietro l’altro e noi con lui, impietositi dal passo zoppo delle pecore morenti, fino al giorno in cui le sopravvissute gli verranno sottratte per essere abbattute. Ha sedicimila euro di debiti solo con il salumiere e sua moglie si è spinta a chiedere aiuto al parroco per sensibilizzare la comunità al loro problema. E’ l’immagine della terra che rigetta su di noi quel che abbiamo seminato, colpendo inesorabilmente il primo che capita a tiro.

All’uscita dal cinema, l'unica cosa che rimane allo spettatore, almeno a quello campano, è la preoccupazione per questa famiglia, che realmente esiste e che rimane senza pecore, senza lavoro e sommersa dai debiti. Il pecoraio riceverà un aiuto reale dallo Stato o dalla comunità che lo circonda, oppure finirà tra le braccia della camorra andando ad ingrossare un circolo vizioso? Sembra che il film questo non se lo chieda.

Enrica Gatto

draft milk - reprise

once in a while i remember that i should give space on this blog to something else than my moody thoughts...

for example, i have updates on the draft milk and detergent issue i posted a couple of months ago. well not updates, just more detailed information.
there are apparently shops spread all over northern-central italy, where detergents are sold "draft": millebolle

and there's a petition to ask to have them in campania too. we might need that even more urgently. worth a shot?!

for more info about "draft" stuff and where to find it, check this post (in italian)

looking for tom - reprise

even though i do know that tom waits did not happen to bump into my blog and did not read my post complaining about him not willing to have any concert soon, it would sound like a nice story to tell...

apparently he's touring again this summer...
just hope i can fit myself into the european constellation :)

vanity

nothing else than vanity. just couldn't resist to take this shot. and to post it.
after all this is a vanity blog.
me me me










after all, wasn't vanity everybody's favourite sin?!

simplification

there are words that should be used carefully. because words are powerful, i already came out with this issue a while ago.
turns out that we have a new government in italy. don't really want to comment about it. but one thing that made me wonder is, there is a new ministry: the ministry of simplification.
s i m p l i f i c a t i o n. whatever it might mean, i don't really care. it's just the choice of the word that i find extremely disturbing. reminds me of some sort of 1984 propaganda atmosphere.
because, in spite of what the word itself may suggest, to simplify is the most difficult task ever. there is a threshold beyond which things cannot be made simpler. some wise scientist of the past might have said something similar once. things are complicated, and you can surely make them simpler, but not simpler than that.
lightness, that's another story. you can deal with complicated things and still leave them light. i believe there is always a way to make things lighter, but not simpler. complexity exists. period.

nemesis

drifted away by too many things, i tend to forget how and why everything started. try to focus on all the little steps i have to take every day, and get carried away thinking where they could get me, eventually. well not that eventually, but still. never go back to the roots. until the roots appear and can't avoid facing them. epiphany.

i went to a talk today, and saw exactly what i somehow expected i wanted to turn into. well, what i expected when i was a kid. an astronomer, extremely confident, presenting her work with energy. passionate. v. clear. not show-off but still sure you know it best. in a suit. am not sure i was imagining the suit as well. might be.
and then i look at me now, and not only i'm soo far from that. i don't really want to be that anymore. nothing wrong about that, just life goes on and things change. i believe i stopped feeling that way a long time ago, but never really observed that thought. yep, because i probably never faced it until now in such a blatant way.

it's not my thing. but is it because i don't want it to be my thing, or just because i can't? foolish question. the will is stronger than the body's weight, as my yoga teacher would say. but my will is weak, or it's just that i'm unforgivably lazy...
but still, don't really know if it's really not my thing. i presume, if that had been the case, i wouldn't have reacted this way. wouldn't have felt bad. would have felt indifferent. wouldn't have become so moody. wouldn't have been at least a teeny tiny bit jealous. wouldn't have needed a half hour jog to wash bad thoughts away.

i used to think of myself that way, but that was ages ago. then i stopped, started thinking of myself as so many different things it's not easy to tell if i hardly resemble any of them. don't feel i want to be that, don't feel i can, maybe both...
should only those people be handling with science?

and i find myself blushing, when i look at me younger, naively imagining something i had no clue about. or maybe i'm blushing because of what i've become??

where the streets have no name

and signs on the road make even less sense. but still they safely get you home, somehow. eventually.
but coffee still circulating and me sleepless preposterously late... so i end up here, again. after all, the constant urge to continuously narrate my life is official by now. like when people find me in the street, speaking with myself while biking and gesturing... no, i am not using a mobile with a headphone. i'm ok. i'm just speaking with myself.