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In a world in which everything has become an image, meaning can only be found in the gaps, in the insignificant, in the surfaces' folds. In the age of the image, the eye has become over-stimulated, tired and longing for rest; its only hope is being able to see the void between the things, the clefts and recesses. The only photographs functioning as havens are those, in which the void, the invisible is coming to light. Maura Donati is trying to go in that direction. Coincidences, the emotional and automated, the mechanical of meeting apparatuses lead to the creation of her photographs. It is something indefinable that tempts her to press the release button of her Leica at a certain moment.

If a photographer "wants" to take a certain photograph, it will never be achieved. This is similar to the experience of the mystic who "wants" a vision. If one does not search for the photograph, it might be encountered. The pictures of Maura Donati are never prepared, nothing is produced, a "study" does not exist, but there is always something that hits the viewer in the eye. There is something that is common to both love and photography: the impossibility to name it, the impossibility to describe it.

Shortened, from: “Die zufällige Schönheit“ ["The accidental beauty"] by Maurizio Rossi

Why did you choose for the second time to use a virtual tour on the Internet to show your latest exhibit "Tizi 'n Tichka", featuring images shot in Morocco, at Galleria DoppiaV, in Lugano, Switzerland?

Even if I'm bound to traditional expressive medias, I'm shooting with film and vintage Leica or Hasselblad cameras, I have been impressed by the promotional power of my first virtual showroom (in fullscreen QuickTime VR) created on September 2003 in VRMag.

What happened?

I didn't anticipate that through the site an Austrian and Chinese gallery, and several journalists would have contacted me. I believe a virtual tour is a great way for an artist to showcase his exhibits to a larger audience. When the exhibit closes, the internet version keeps open 24 hours a day, 360 days a year, and is found by people googling my name, taking this into consideration, the cost of few thousand euros becomes a profitable investment, and ultimately a service to anybody from all over the world, unable to visit my exhibits in the physical world.

Could your concept be applied to QTVR?

Eventually yes, thus I never thought about it, especially since my workflow currently doesn't include digital image correction, which I know to be a considerable part of VR photography: the post production process. My images are based on motion, a VR requires motion to be viewed, it could become interesting...

Do you plan to shoot QTVRs one day, if yes what subjects would you start with?

Why not? It might represent an interesting challenge and eventually broaden the Field Of View. I believe I would shoot individuals (people) in their environments, as I'm doing now.

Would you share with us your future artistic projects?

Currently I'm in the initial stage of a new project, related to Buddhist philosophy, culture, and religion, but it's too early to talk about, I'm sorry. But I can tell you that from September 15 to 21, 2005 I will be at the Biennale of Beijing, China.

On the occasion of a recent exhibition of yours in Berlin somebody wrote that your photographs are “like love”: the same impossibility to define them, to give a description of them. Beauty as an accident. Do you perceive your own images this way?

What I do or I don?t do with my camera is an attempt to portrait something that can?t be portraited. In primitive cultures image is the same as the thing it stays for, but in our culture the exact opposite happens. Images stay open, less defined. As a child I was already attracted by screens and I would take photographs of TVs; may-be I was trying to capture something authentic out of the fictitious. Today I often take photographs during the night, because the absence of precise contours, and artificial lights, provides more freedom in the meeting with the camera. I deeply believe that living has very little to do with doing. The obsession of being always active alienates us from both our inner world and the outside world. When I take pictures I don?t do much, I allow myself to be surprised by what happens between the camera and the light. Mine is mostly an estrangement. But still in that moment, when so to say I?m taking a picture without really being there, I am there more than ever. And there is no way to describe with words what is generated by the film being exposed to light.

Your pictures often represent the empty space amongst things, a world of hollows and spaces in-between. What kind of value have these “non-places”, these empty spaces, in your imagery?

My images would like to be something like a pause, a crack in the wall, that I could watch for hours; an interruption, but also an opening, a possibility. It is not necessary that everything becomes closed again afterwards. Systematic philosophy tends towards closing up; life doesn't.

Your photography enhances movement, speed, fleeting things. How do you consider the relationship between these concepts and the individual?

What I intend to do with my pictures is to loosen something, to free something. It is difficult to associate life with what is too strictly defined, concluded, static.

Do you believe in traveling standing still?

We never do anything but that.

What do you think about the sense of belonging to places?

Since I am half Italian and half German, no place gives me a sense of belonging as in being native of that place. But in some places I happen to feel like a part of a whole. A bit like what happened to Nietzsche on his bench in Sils Maria.

How important was traveling in your individual and artistic training?

Every journey, whether it is a real journey or an inner one, stimulates me a great deal.
Portions of the above Q&A were originally published in Aria magazine

Maura Donati studied philosophy and psychology in Milan; she also took German studies in Heidelberg and photography in Rockport (USA). She is professor of german language and literature in Lugano (CH) and her studio provides philosophical counseling.

Related Links:
- Philopraxis.ch
- Berlin Exhibit
- GalleriaDoppiaV
Email: maodonati[at]ticino[dot]com