I started this project at the same moment when I realised that something important was happening in the world of artificial intelligence. A sort of epiphany of digital evolution in which the protagonist was generative AI, capable of transforming anything I could think of (or almost) into images.
Instead of relying on chance, I thought it would be more interesting to have a method. Almost immediately, I remembered Geoff Dyer’s essay
‘The Infinite Instant’, in which the writer identifies and investigates a number of key themes in 20th century American photography.
Elements that connect photographers distant in time and space. For example: benches, hats, hands, streets, windows, barber shops, accordion players. Elements that appear in photographs by Eggleston, Evans, Frank, Friedlander, Lange, Misrach, Shore, Weston and many others.
My goal - from the very beginning - was certainly not the originality of themes and subjects, but the satisfaction of a curiosity. That is, to peer into the possibilities of this
new tool and try to understand what we are up against in our near future.
I have produced two picture books:
one in black and white and one in colour.
Both are inspired by the imagery that the aforementioned photographers have sown in me. It is about an America that does not exist, often contaminated by elements that distort reality, saturated colours and meaningless events.
