Where Are Skilifts Supposed to Be?

I took this photograph on a surreal winter morning when the Adriatic coastline had been transformed into something closer to the Alps than a seaside promenade. The skier, moving steadily away from me, became the anchor for the scene — his posture calm, almost resigned, as though he knew full well there would be no skilifts waiting for him ahead.

From a compositional standpoint, I wanted the perspective lines to work hard here. The lamp posts, the pavement edges, even the faint ski tracks converge toward the centre, guiding the eye deeper into the image. The figure is positioned just off-centre, allowing the street to breathe while still holding the viewer’s focus.

Exposure was tricky. Snow reflects light mercilessly, and with the flat overcast sky there was a real risk of producing a dull, textureless foreground. I opened up just enough to retain detail in the snow without blowing out the highlights, though this inevitably deepened the shadows in the figure. That contrast, however, helps to separate him from the pale surroundings.

There’s an inherent absurdity in the subject matter — skis on a boulevard lined with palm trees and graffiti — but the image doesn’t mock it. Instead, it treats it as a fleeting document of a weather anomaly, a frozen vignette of adaptation and persistence. The snow, the silence, the solitary figure: all conspire to make you ask not just where the skilifts are, but why he set out at all.