Monsieur Villègle

If I had enough energy I would

force myself to fall in love again.  Feeling fine or even euphoric ‘cause there’s still room for a sigh in my heart.

 

The cosmopolitan appeal of this town has almost removed any smell of provincialism in me.

I take care of myself, walk until late, look at the sky and rip adverts off the walls

not a real crime indeed, rather a teeny infraction.

Here is what.

 

Scraping the city is a vexation and a healthy exercise as well

I practice en plain air and take what the town gives: a word, a face, a picture,

(yesterday, behind a piano concert flyer, I found a small part of nude).

 

After so many years spent studying the infinite potential of the empty,

trying to catch and link together the rambling filaments of the matter,

I’ve come upon the genuine and revolutionary power

of the gray walls

 

I think of you often, in your small laboratory

adjusting the width of the ocular lenses to scrutinize the delicacy of a poetic sequence

and missing, a few steps away, the grace of a slightly asymmetric smile

caught in a moment of wonder.

 

I show my artworks out in the open

to have them stroked, hit and messed up by the wind.

They fold into whimsical shapes, play, sing and move,

come and go

as they please.

Fiat 600 Multipla – photo installation – test #1

# 8

Lumières

Solomon was still enjoying

the painting in the smoking room

a minute before drowning

 

he sunk down with the trees

the apples (pears were not ripe yet)

and flamboyant exotic flowers

 

viscous details Nature exposes

to the sun, the rain, the negligence

condition sine qua non to make us feel true

 

my hair, skin, iris

colors had once been joined

in a cold amalgam

 

decline and creation, nearing the end

some places come into blossom:

another seductive paradox

Saint Michael’s Abbey, Turin (Italy)

#7

The comets

Skies get smaller when the comets devour them. It’s what kites were called where he was from. He used to make comets and play with them down the beach. He spent half of his life handling the long kite string against the wind to feel its strength, the rest trying to fix thin papers to dried swamp reeds with homemade glue.

When the invitation to the first international exhibition came, he showed up with a brand new piece: a yellow paper biplane with a red-painted flower on the top wings that recalled the brand of a supermarket.

Simple and with a reduced visual impact if compared to the rival architectures, that suburban kite was the only one that day to take off and duel against the riotous winds blowing across the competition field.

Witnesses, experts and jury ventured guesses about the complicated implications of the elements when simultaneously act in a particular situation. Other theories stayed unexplored.

The ask for sharing the project left him bewildered. In a blank page of the journal, he drew a few lines which summed up his personal concept of aerodynamics.

A few minutes later, he tapped trice the tip of the pen on the page and said “I still have doubts about this point”. With no other hesitation, he left the room. They had been waiting for him for ten years.

Art show. Ferrara (Italy)

MICROfiction #24

The love alphabet

Life is hard for collectors. Only a few samples of the entire collection of photographs slipped through her fingers. She jealously treasured it to the end. The reason for such a strict custody lies in the folders of this story.

They fell in love on the eve of the War, which left them both unharmed. He, a test pilot, used to wear a pair of thin mustache, à la mode until 1937. She, conveniently desirable and given to reverie, couldn’t stop smiling and addressing him letters in a delicate and airy handwriting that she thought proper for her unique and special reader.

In return, she received overexposed snap-shots, stressed by an intangible chromatic intensity, painfully suffocated or burnt by the solar bulb, which he imprudently took during his solo flights.

The first she got was wholly black. She promptly praised his effort to catch the entirety without falling behind the single element. Nevertheless, she exhorted him not to exclude other ways to approach the universal beauty.

Such a warm support produced an increase in his audacity and more shots soon came: inconsistent walls of clouds, massive skies opening on a solid void that she imagined to be desperately deaf to the comforting sound of the backwash and the leaves rustling.

In a word, they made up a new love alphabet. And it drew the interest of the public.

When she was called to share her memories or unveil their secrets, she waved and said “Phew! He was a skilled dancer, but often his steps were out of my reach.”

Fenestrelle Fortress, Val Chisone (Turin) Italy

MICROfiction #23

Vencido

He made the revolution, eventually. In its name, he left me, just trailing the door behind. I have no clear memories of that day but an iron wire ball that still lies on my table. I made it by hand while he was turning around the room listing, with wide gestures and not in order of importance, the principles of the “big cause”.

We never met again until when I stepped into that photo studio. Two huge rice paper chandeliers and a lot of pictures untidily glued to the walls made the room agreeable. I saw him. It was hurting.

I got closer to take a better look. In that black-and-white shot, he was surrounded by friends, the party was on. Smart but moderate, serious but confident, his look went straight to the camera. But the smile was tepid and the eyes darker than usual. In that look I saw the doubt of having been misunderstood growing all over.

Just behind them, only part of the famous motto was readable. The last word indeed: “vencido”.

MICROfiction #22

A1: the very best of

of the journey this is a brief part

a long queue, a rite of passage,

(not a significant turning point, indeed)

 

Photo Festival – SIFEST in Savignano sul Rubicone, Italy

# 6

The strong hour

the firmament

– are you smiling already?

shows a primordial pattern

 

just see,

– I tend to believe what you say

the stars in the strong hour

 

observation is an exercise

for steady hearts, eyes

need more solid bodies

 

over this tiny valley

(I’m reading in your diary)

the moon is slipping unnoticed,

only roots-equipped beings know

what is going on

and where

 

flames and ice

the transit of a celestial body

fuel

 

from this perspective

it isn’t worth the trouble

– a domestic injury, at most

 

So, let’s take this chain of events

(contemplation is a pastime for respectable mademoiselle)

some parsimony is preferable, I guess

 

metamorphosis is what I’m most afraid of:

memories lend themselves to misinterpretations

easy targets – they become

easy targets

– for moths

 

Interior – Varano de Melegari Castle, Parma – Italy

# 5

The Turkish collector

"The Flea market" part 3. Part 1 here. Part 2 here.

“An expensive illusion of immortality?”

Oh my God, no. I’m just a collector and as a collector I plumb the depth of life through art.

At that time, I was more than that. I was some sort of faithless mystic man. Someone who stands between coexisting contrasts: the plan and the act, the charm and the revulsion, the routine and the unknown.

The picture suited me and I bought it. I was still persuaded that key events could block the clock and beauty unveil the truth. I believed artworks needed the hand, other than the viewer’s eye, to get a motion. And it was not for passion or lust if I dared to touch the line of that pale back far beyond the frame; rather a way to ignite the sacred fire of inspiration.

Then, life taught me I was wrong and man is nothing more that a bright reflection the moment before diving into dark waters. And history lies heavy on his shoulders. How could art represent him without darker, more tangible and denser colors?

It had nothing to do with the photo. I got rid of it ‘cause I changed school of thought.

That’s it.

Bardi Castle – Inside view – Parma, Italy

MicroFICTION # 20

Léger’s human figure

"The Flea market" part 2. Part 1 here.

No, I didn’t break up with him for that photo.

For that photo, no, indeed. It was of a Machiavellian ambiguity; it lacked of passion or the renaissance features that hold the observer’s elbow while stepping into the frame, waiting for him to be accustomed to the lights and ready to be overwhelmed by the story.

Where was the symbolic bridge that links the inside to the outside world? And that mirror game, it gave it but a flat double-reading, like a playing-card.

The scene was factitious, accurate but cold and even the female body, mine in that case, tossed like that in the middle of the room couldn’t mitigate the unpleasant feeling of the imminent drama.

I pointed all this out and he took it badly.

The flame increased. “Human figure is not more important than a key or a bicycle” he said citing Léger. “It’s nonsense” I replied “Léger gave every single element of the scene a plastic value, making it part of the artwork, including the human figure!”

We argued still for some time, then the insolent whiteness of his shirt slipped into a taxi.

Yes, I broke up with him for that photo.

London – UK

MicroFICTION # 19

 

The flea market

She flung the door wide open, then went in and threw at me an old wooden frame, abruptly.  I recognized it at once. I took that shot myself at the beginning of my career and it caused – that’s what she used to say – the end of our affair.

It was still nice; a portrait of her, naked, the back turned. A natural geometry made it very interesting but, due to an unintentional mirror game, some details in the scene told more than expected. A piece of blue sky, something vivid but out of focus and the dark silhouette of a branch reminded of the joy of living, while the black dress on the unmade bed evoked nothing but the ghost of the woman who had once worn it. Though in evidence, she looked distant, elsewhere.

That’s why she left me.

So, I decided to get rid of that picture and sold it to a Turkish collector. I chose him impulsively. More than once, I imagined him standing still in the middle of a room in a flamboyant museum full of golden stucco, trying to follow the line of that pale back far beyond the frame and grab, finally, his expensive illusion of immortality.

When I asked her how she got it back, I received a bitter and illogical answer.

“What the hell!” I told myself “I can’t stand flea markets”.

Against the light

MicroFICTION #18