Giorgio Barrera: Through the Window
Friday, April 4, 2008
Window #11a (from “Through the Window”)
© Giorgia Barrera
Giorgio Barrera’s series of photographs titled Through the Window is an examination of the blurred boundary between outside and inside (public and private) space. Formally, Barrera is concerned with the idea of framing within a frame.
Thus when we see open windows appearing inside an image, the impression we always get is that of a painting within a painting or a photograph within a photograph, a further framing that is at times capable of absorbing and blanking out the function of the first and more decisive act of framing.
Window #33b (from “Through the Window”)
© Giorgia Barrera
His process is equally interesting, as the images represent moments that are not staged but carefully lit and composed.
The camera is placed in front of a residential building and directed towards one or more windows, at a variable distance but so that they should occupy a considerable or at least a decisive portion of the shot; in the remaining area one can occasional make out the architectural details of the house, of the nearby areas, of the neighboring buildings. Beyond the panes, the residents, aware of the photographer’s presence, are busy in their everyday activities, as they await the flash units arranged inside the room to be remotely activated by the author, whenever he sees fit, so that he can suitably light the scene and at the same time take the shot.
The result is beautiful.
Window #22 (from “Through the Window”)
© Giorgia Barrera
See more of Barrera’s work here. And don’t miss his other projects, particularly Battlefields and Psychologies.
