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Alessia Morellini (IT)
(1) Please introduce yourself: What is your name, where are you from, what do you do?
Morellini Alessia (1985). I live and work in Modena. My life is animated by two passions: photography and travel. While attending university, I began as a self-taught photographer to capture the solitary and aseptic scenarios of the Po Valley, and then moved my research beyond the national borders. I work as a freelance photographer in the commercial field, but my passion remains travel photography.
(2) What is your relationship with photography and how did you get into it?
I'm a self-taught photographer. I immediately gave up on the idea of enrolling in an academy, but I decided to deepen my discipline by consulting essays and photographic books by various authors, first of all [Luigi] Ghirri.
(3) What do you think triggers you to photograph in a certain moment? Is it planned or solely driven by intuition?
In my case, it was a gradual discovery through the old camera of my father (I know it sounds like a cliché). At the beginning, it was a joke with him. Then, when I began my first travels and I saw the result of the film , everything changed, and I planned little projects instead of random photos.
(4) What is the story you want your pictures to tell?
I want to vehicular a sense of calm and quiet in this frenetic and chaotic world, a small pause and refresh for the eyes of the observers.
(5) Which city would you like to visit the most, and why?
It's not a particular city, it's a macro area: the west part of America; with its desolate landscapes, the colour of the desert, the magical atmosphere.
(6) What is your personal relationship to cities and how do you perceive them as places in general?
They give me a real charge. I'm curious to discover every single corner of them, and I always plan journeys in cities different from each other for capturing all the shades.
(7) What is the driving force behind creation?
The curiosity and the hunger to discover new places, meet new sources of inspiration, and new types of editing.
(8) Which project did you never finish?
It's not a real incomplete project, but last year when I visited Jerusalem, I decided (in some spiritual places like the Church of the Holy Sepulchre) to put away my camera; I didn't want to interfere with the magical moment for the faithful and didn't want to lose the power of those scenes with my only eyes.
(9) What is that «one thing» you have never managed to photograph and is now gone for good?
During the last two years, I became more confident and certain of my skills. I pushed away my shyness and made pictures of a variety of people.
(10) If you could travel back / forth in time, what advice would you give your younger / older self?
I would tell myself to take my time, do not rush because quality is more important than quantity.
(11) What do you prefer saying: To «take a photograph» or to «make a photograph», and why?
I prefer the term "make» because it suggests a sort of creation, an artefact that you can do with your skills.
(12) What is the most interesting experience you have had while photographing?
During a journey in Istanbul, I was making some photos in the old souq while a small group of Chinese tourists asked me if I wanted to pose like their model...maybe it is not so interesting, but it's a fun fact :))
(13) If it wasn’t for photography, what would you be interested in doing instead?
I want to work in a library :))))
(14) How would you describe one of your pictures to a visually impaired person?
I think that my pictures are like a caress on your face, a whispered kind word, or a walk on the sand.
(15) What are you currently working on, and—if there is—what is your next project or journey?
I want to plan a journey in Morocco. I really miss the calm of the desert, just like the chaos of the medina.
Thank you, Alessia.
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Images
1–14 Alessia Morellini, 2016–2020.
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