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Portrait of a Perinatal Cardiologist
Salvatore Gerboni, MD, is an expert perinatal cardiologist and a great human being.
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Streetlight Duet
Late-day sun is the best kind of collaborator—less commanding than noon, more generous than twilight. It brushed the scene just enough to lift texture from skin and fabric without blowing out detail. I didn’t ask them to pose, but the casual lean against the car and the hand over the guitar’s body settled naturally. That balance between intimacy and performative posture intrigued me. This shot could have easily slipped into cliché—two musicians and a guitar, the standard fare of street portraits. But the subtle discord between expression and energy saves it. One wears a smile that could go either way: pride or deflection. The other looks on with the quiet…
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Portrait of a Politician – 2
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Portrait of a young guitar player
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Portrait of a (former) bike champion
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The Angel Maker
There are some things you only find in Rome. Down a narrow street behind the Teatro di Pompeo, inside a studio that smells of dust, turpentine and time, I watched a man restoring angels. Not metaphorically—literally. Plaster cherubs laid out across the table, grey with primer, one mid-stroke under his steady brush. The place looked more like a reliquary than a workshop. And in a way, it was. He’s a master restorer. The kind of figure you expect in an old Fellini film, surrounded by faded tapestries, cracked frames, and gold leaf so fine it breathes when you exhale near it. But this wasn’t a scene. This was a day’s…
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Audience
In photographing an audience, the temptation is often to go wide — to show the collective body, the sea of faces, the shared focus. Here, I chose the opposite: a tight, side-on profile of three individuals, all absorbed in what unfolds beyond the frame. The decision to compress the moment into this narrow slice has the effect of isolating their concentration, making it almost tangible. The focal point rests squarely on the man in the centre. His expression is unreadable yet engaged, his glasses catching just enough light to reveal his eyes without introducing glare. The woman to his left, partially hidden, offers a second layer of depth, while the…
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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…
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Staying Behind
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Conversation
In a gallery, the art is never just on the walls. It spills into the spaces between people, into the exchanges and body language of those who come to see it. This frame was taken in such a moment — a candid intersection between two visitors, locked in a discussion that seemed as textured and layered as the paintings around them. I placed them in the foreground, letting the shallow depth of field push the artworks into a soft blur. The defocus serves two purposes: it keeps the viewers’ attention on the pair, and it transforms the background into a muted, abstract backdrop — just enough to hint at the…
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Portrait of an Heavy Metal Singer
Devilish, isn’t it?
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Portrait of a Bailaor
It’s not the dance itself. Not the movement. Not the raised heel or arched arm. It’s the moment in between. I took this portrait during a flamenco performance—close up, no motion blur, no sweeping gesture. Just a still frame of pure tension. The bailaor had just stepped out of a phrase. His hair wet from exertion, shirt unbuttoned from heat. He was motionless, but the intensity hadn’t left. It was gathering. What struck me wasn’t the obvious theatricality. It was the way his focus seemed to cut straight through the light. His jaw tight, eyes narrowed, not toward the crowd, but somewhere inward. Flamenco isn’t about smiling through the steps. It’s about…
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Portrait of a Judo Master
The heritage of Kano Jigoro is still alive. The sensei is caught slightly off-centre, mid-step, his gaze lowered rather than directed at the camera. The gi is worn, functional, unadorned. It carries the marks of use rather than ceremony. His posture is relaxed but grounded, suggesting familiarity with the space and with his own body within it. Nothing here is posed, and that is precisely where the portrait gains its weight. There is no throw, no grip exchange, no demonstrative movement. He expresses authority not through force but through a quiet, meaningful, presence. In the background, softly out of focus, hangs the photograph of Kano Jigoro. It is not framed…
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Portrait of a young scholar
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Portrait of a Wrestler
There’s a particular weight to portraits of athletes, especially those whose craft is as primal and disciplined as wrestling. When I took this photograph, I wanted to strip away the spectacle of the sport—no mats, no crowds, no action—and focus instead on the man behind the contest. The framing is deliberately close, the upper torso and head taking dominance in the composition. The subject’s direct gaze into the lens is neither aggressive nor performative; it’s a quiet, steady presence. The choice of black and white enhances this honesty, removing any distraction of colour and forcing the viewer to engage with form, texture, and light. In the background, out of focus,…
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Portrait of a Master luthier
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Portrait of a politician – 1
There’s a certain pleasure in photographing with the Leica M9—a camera that rewards precision and patience rather than machine-gun bursts. This portrait was made in a crowded hall, the politician seated among an audience whose attention was turned toward the stage. The light was far from forgiving, a mix of weak ambient and uneven spot sources, but the M9’s sensor responded with a tonal richness that digital cameras often lose in harsh conditions. I chose to work wide open, which gave me the shallow depth of field needed to isolate his face from the visual chaos around him. The crowd dissolves into a swirl of shapes and tonal smudges, leaving…
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Portrait of aTocaor
There is no audience in the frame, no dancer to mark the beat, no palmas to answer the rhythm—just the tocaor, alone with his guitar. The photograph is intimate, stripped of spectacle, and in that simplicity lies its strength. Shot in black and white, the image pares down the moment to texture and expression. The grain and contrast evoke the deep tradition of flamenco portraiture, where the absence of colour invites the viewer to listen with their eyes. The focus is on the face—eyes closed, lips resting in concentration—as the player leans toward the neck of the guitar. This is not a performance for the world but an inward conversation,…
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Portrait of a Waiter
Another day is going to start, and the ashtrays are ready to filled by the deadly dust…
