What inspired you to create works of art and to become an artist? (events, feelings, experiences...)
I discovered that I was comfortable with photography late in life, but I had already had a taste for observation from a very young age.
For me, the camera is much more than an object to capture mundane things.
This prompted me to practice this activity regularly and to do something more artistic with it.
I think we all have an innate talent but sometimes we don't discover it right away.
Maybe it was time for me to express what I saw.
What is your artistic background, the techniques and subjects you have experimented with so far?
I rubbed shoulders with the artistic world in my city. I was invited to openings.
A friend offered me to exhibit. It was like a call, an evidence, and even a deliverance.
I ended up exhibiting in Amiens and its metropolis.
Expose and therefore be confronted with the public eye.
But above all, I photograph for myself. These are moments of grace, wonder and peace.
What are the 3 aspects that differentiate you from other artists, making your work unique?
The 3 aspects that differentiate me from other artists, I don't know. Instinct, improvisation, I try to put some fantasy into the titles of the photos.
Each of the photos is a personal search, revealing the deep self.
Where does your inspiration come from?
Details inspire me. But also the sounds stimulate me. And fog when there is! It takes cohesion to then get a photo out of it.
What is your artistic approach? What visions, sensations or feelings do you want to evoke in the viewer?
First, it's a personal process. I try to be original but it's not always easy when you start going back to the same places.
Poetry, light and simplicity are the words most evoked by the viewer. For my part, to bring to see something other than what we perceive in reality.
Photographer Aaron Siskind sums it up: "When we look at the world, we see what we have learned to see in it,
conditioned reflexes, we must learn to forget them."
What is the process of creating your works? Spontaneous or with a long preparatory process (technical, inspiration from art classics or other)?
Spontaneity but photography like everything, requires training and perseverance.
Do you use a particular working technique? if so, can you explain it?
I don't have any particular working technique. I learned and continue to learn photography through books and the internet.
I also know a professional photographer who gave me some advice.
I favor spontaneity. I look at what surrounds me, then I spot where I am attracted to a subject.
Are there any innovative aspects in your work? Can you tell us which ones?
There are no innovative aspects but rather trying to find other approaches or unexpected angles of the subjects photographed.
Do you have a format or medium that you are most comfortable with? if yes, why ?
No particular format It depends on the photo.
Where do you produce your works? At home, in a shared workshop or in your own workshop? And in this space, how do you organize your creative work?
I always practice photography outdoors.
I go out preferably in the morning for the fog and because there are fewer people. I find the morning prettier.
The early evening is also interesting.
Does your work lead you to travel to meet new collectors, for fairs or exhibitions? If so, what does it bring you?
The photographs are taken in my region, mainly Amiens and its metropolis. Amiens being my hometown, I know it inside out but I still find surprises!
How do you imagine the evolution of your work and your career as an artist in the future?
I imagine more refined, more original photos, daring to do something else. Finally everything depends on my personal evolution, my motivation and what I find on my way.
What is the theme, style or technique of your latest artistic production?
For now, I don't have a theme or style. Progress in the black and white photo.
Can you tell us about your most important exhibition experience?
When I exhibited in a café in a district of Amiens, I walked past and saw people looking at the photos, they were happy.
Besides, this is where I had the most unpretentious buyers.
If you could have created a famous work in the history of art, which one would you choose? And why ?
Magritte's Son of Man. He evokes this work during an interview: “Everything cannot exist without its mystery. It is, moreover, proper to the mind to know that there is mystery. (...) An apple, for example, raises questions. (...) In a recent painting, I showed an apple in front of a character's face. (...) At least, it partly hides his face. Well there, then, there is the apparent face, the apple that hides the hidden face, the face of the character. It's something that happens all the time. Each thing we see hides another, we always want to see what is hidden by what we see. There is an interest in what is hidden and that the visible does not show us. This interest can take the form of a rather intense feeling, a kind of fight I would say, between the hidden visible and the apparent visible. »
If you could invite one famous artist (dead or alive) to dinner, who would it be? How would you suggest he spend the evening?
Bashung for his poetry, his subtlety and Aaron Siskind for his other photographic reality.
Olimpia Gaia Martinelli
