-
Countersniping
The lens meets a lens. Framed by rusted beams and peeling walls, the photographer at the centre of the image takes aim with his camera, returning the gaze. The graffiti around him, the fire extinguisher sign, the rough concrete surfaces, all belong to a decayed environment, yet the act of photographing transforms it into theatre. It becomes a duel of sightlines—one click against another. Composition directs attention without ambiguity. The eye is pulled straight to the figure at the back, the camera lens perfectly aligned to confront the viewer. The foreground, with its blurred metal structures, creates a visual crosshair. This layering enforces the theme of surveillance, ambush, and reciprocity.…
-
So long and thank you for the fish
Well, this is not exactly the Restaurant at the End of the Universe — but you get the idea. The scene is a working dock, somewhere between the last haul of the day and the quiet moment before the boat heads out again. A fisherman, clad in yellow waterproofs, stands mid-task, surrounded by crates of glistening nets and freshly caught fish. The deck of the boat, the worn concrete, the splashes of green and red from the gear — it’s a palette that speaks of utility rather than design. The composition benefits from the elevated vantage point. Shooting from above flattens the scene into a graphic arrangement of lines, textures,…
-
Just a soccer field… Part 3
-
Just a soccer field… Part 2
-
Just a Soccer Field… Part 1
Just a soccer field… the only place where freedom lasts, but just for the time of a match.
-
In-Eye
Photography has a curious way of leading the mind into patterns — an instinctive search for meaning, even when none exists. We are hardwired to interpret shapes and juxtapositions, to anthropomorphise objects, to find faces in clouds and stories in shadows. This image is one such case: a seemingly simple shot of a ship seen through a weathered window, yet the geometry conspires to suggest something far more figurative. Here, the diamond-shaped porthole becomes an eyelid, its corroded frame the brow, and beyond it, the bow of the ship forms an unmistakable iris and pupil. It’s a quiet trick of composition — one I noticed only after the fact —…
-
The Google Experiment
The usual note: I don’t write about gear. But this time I want to do an experiment inspired by the consequences of having the post about Street Photography and Italian Law bounced by Adam Marelli and Luminous-Landscape. Since these two websites channeled my post around the world, the access to (other parts too of) my blog – mostly unknown, previously – steady increased. I’m far from saying that I’ve reached an “audience”, nevertheless this blog is gaining its space among the zillions of pictures that live on the Internet. And it is “quality” space, meaning that visitors (you’re always welcome, folks!) find something of interest by looking at my pictures…
-
Good Idea
… bad execution. The shot would have been acceptable if the head of the fisherman had the sky as a background instead of the bow.
-
Against the Tide
There’s a stillness in this frame that caught me before I even thought about the technical side. A lone figure on a bicycle, paused at the edge of the pier, framed by the unbroken horizon and the muted textures of concrete and water. The light is soft, almost hesitant — no harsh shadows, no dazzling highlights — as if the scene itself wanted to remain understated. I worked to keep the composition balanced but not too neat. The lamp post on the right anchors the image without overpowering it, while the figure sits almost at the centre, enough to draw the eye but still letting the expanse of sea and…
-
W Verdi
Milan rewards you when you walk slowly. I turned a corner and found a living quotation mark to a poster: an elderly man paused beneath a billboard of a stern, bearded face—Giuseppe Verdi by way of contemporary graphic design. The likeness was uncanny enough to make the old slogan in my head—Viva Verdi—mutate into “W Verdi,” a wink at how public imagery and real life can rhyme. I built the frame around that rhyme. The poster anchors the top-right quadrant while the man occupies the lower-left, a diagonal conversation that keeps the eye ping-ponging across the picture. I left generous negative space to let the pairing breathe; too tight and…
-
Carabinieri in Milan
Milan’s downtown it’s not the most dangerous place out there, nevertheless is always nice to see the Carabinieri walking around…
You May Also Like
Leo Gullotta – Bartleby lo scrivano@Teatro Marrucino
Conversation
Damned Pidgeons…
-
Lost Bottles
I found them by accident, tucked into a shadowy corner of a collapsing shed — still standing, still sealed, thick with dust and memory. The light coming in from a broken window caught the glass just enough to animate the greens and browns. These weren’t just empty bottles; they were forgotten time capsules — unopened, useless, and somehow alive. This image is all texture. The rough chalky surface of the dust, the worn corks, the splinters in the labels. I didn’t clean or move anything. What mattered was fidelity to the scene, not styling it. Every bottle sits where it was found. The composition is tight, cropped to eliminate the…
-
Ni
I photographed this wall for its simplicity: two scraps of weathered wood fixed to rough concrete, nothing more. Yet in their placement they formed a minimal composition, two marks on a textured surface that immediately reminded me of the Japanese character for “two” (二). It was not intended, but the resonance was unavoidable once I saw it through the viewfinder. The surface itself does much of the work. The granular, uneven wall contrasts sharply with the grain of the old planks. The top piece, broader and darker, bears the scars of age—splits, nails, faint stains. The lower fragment, smaller and lighter, almost echoes it, as if the two are in…
-
Luck is an Attitude
That’s an interesting catch. The Latin word for “luck” is “fortuna” that doesn’t mean “luck”, but “fate”. So I’d rather like to be, as an old aphorism from Appius Claudius Caecus says (“Fabrum esse quemque fortunae suae) the “builder of my own fate”.
-
What Lasts of a Saturday Night Party
Another week-end is gone. Ordinary life gets kicking-in back. A cigarette butt, a crumpled flyer announcing a Saturday night out, and the cold geometry of rusted iron bars were all that remained. The contrast between the fleeting promise of fun and the permanence of decay was unavoidable. From a compositional standpoint, the shot relies heavily on framing. The bars of the grate, corroded and heavy with age, create a literal barrier between viewer and subject. They cut across the image in thick lines, forcing the eye downward into the scene. The detritus beneath—the soaked paper, the stub, the fragments of broken glass—becomes both imprisoned and revealed. Depth is enhanced by…
-
Italy, Landscape Photography and the Law
Welcome back to the “Law, Order and Photography in Italy” series. The second episode (the first being about Street-Photography) deals with Landscape Photography and, again, provides practical advise for the photographer who travels through Italy shooting its nature. Summary Landscape Photography, at first sight, looks like a piece of cake. No need to hip shoot, no fear of being confronted by an illiterate policeman or angry passerby, no model-release to carry… just you, your camera and your subject: the Nature. But things, as often in Italy, aren’t that simple since rules and regulations extend (literally) up to the top of the mountains. To put it short, there are a few…
-
Lost Cigarettes at Piazza Affari
The Milan Stock-Exchange is just closed, another stressful day is gone, so are the cigarettes. The Milan Stock Exchange has just closed. Another day of trading — of numbers, speculation, tension, and relief — is over. The square begins to exhale. The crowds thin, footsteps fade, and the traces of human presence remain in small, almost invisible ways. Here, in a shallow puddle on the cobblestones of Piazza Affari, the day’s residue is quietly recorded: cigarette butts, scraps, and the inverted grandeur of a neoclassical façade. I was drawn to the way the water held both the building’s form and the detritus of the day in a single frame. The reflection, sharp…
-
A Fashion Shop in Milan
In a fashion shop is always hard to tell the difference beween a model and a store clerk.
-
Let’s get the party started…
Fishing boats have a way of announcing themselves well before they reach the harbour wall. The sound of the engine carries over the water, but it’s the birds that really give them away — a moving cloud of wings and calls, circling, swooping, waiting for the scraps that will inevitably be thrown overboard. This shot catches the “Nuova Zita” in that precise moment of return, driving straight toward me, bow cutting through the water, foam rising in a perfect V. I chose a dead-centre composition, a choice some might consider too rigid, but here it felt essential. The boat’s symmetry — red trim framing the white hull, the vertical mast…
-
The Guardian
Not scaring as a Pitbull would, but still deserving to be handled with care… He didn’t move. Not even when I approached with the camera. Not even when I paused to adjust the lens. He just stared—calm, unblinking, sure of his place. This photo was taken outside a closed wooden structure. Maybe a seasonal shack, maybe a beachside store. The railings were weathered, the wood silvered by sun and salt. Everything about the setting felt unfinished, in-between. Except for him. The black cat sat at the centre like he’d been assigned the role. Not hiding, not curious—just there. Positioned perfectly in the geometry of the fence, flanked by empty space…
-
A Portrait on the Nasdaq Building
I took this photograph in the year 2000, standing in front of the Nasdaq building and staring at a giant portrait of a man whose name I never learned. The caption read “July 1985” — perhaps the date of his death — and the grainy, blown-up image suggested an older video still. In the upper-left of the portrait, there were shelves lined with what looked like vinyl records. That detail nudged me toward thinking he might have been a musician or someone who worked in the recording industry. But it’s speculation. What I could say with certainty was that his expression stopped me in my tracks. There was a strange…
-
So Long, Eos-M
A couple of days ago, while wandering around a street-market, I spotted a small “exhibit” of old Nikon and Hasselblad lenses. I thought it would have been nice to get the two “classic” lenses for the System V, so I traded my Eos-M (and lenses) for a Carl Zeiss lenses: a Distagon 50 and a Sonnar 150. The seller was eager to strike the deal, but I’m not sure who actually got the best bargain…
-
Slow Walk at Mulberry St.
-
Late Night Arrival at Bertinoro’s Castle
There’s something about fog that eats light and sound in equal measure. At Bertinoro that night, the mist rolled in thick and silent, swallowing the medieval walls until they were no more than looming shapes. The only figure breaking the gloom was this woman, striding toward the castle gate with a purpose that suggested she hoped — perhaps against reason — that someone inside might still be awake. I shot this in black and white not as an afterthought, but because the scene demanded it. Colour would have been irrelevant here — the atmosphere was all about tonal gradation, shadow, and grain. Yes, grain. This isn’t the crisp, low-noise look…
