Biography
Born in Buenos Aires in 1972. He studied Mechanical Engineering in the UBA. Between 1998 and 2000 he took part in the workshops given by Juan Travnik and Fabiana Barreda. In 2001 he was awarded Best Photographer of the Year, Best Photography Exhibition (2006) by the Asociación Argentina de Críticos de Arte, and the Leonardo award to photography, given by the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes (2001). He has exhibited his work individually in ICI (2001) Photogallery, TSM (2002), MAMBA (2003), CC Rojas (2003), Galería Dabbah-Torrejón (2006), Belgium (2002), Spain (2002/2006), United Kingdom (2003), France (2004), United States (2004, 2005, 2006), Netherlands (2005, 2006), Mexico (2004, 2005). In 2002 he was awarded with the artist residency fellowship of the Skopelos Centre of Photography, Greece. Received the fellowships given by the Fundación Antorchas (2003) and UNESCO-Aschberg, Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs / DCO / IC (2004) to do an artist residency in the Rijkakademie van Beeldende Kunsten, Amsterdam (2004, 2005). In 2006 he did the artist residency of the Casa de Velázquez (Madrid, Spain), and Onoma AIR-Fiskars, Finland (2007).
Vision of art
1. Choose a work that represents you, describe it in relation to its format and materiality, its relation with time and space, its style and theme; detail its production process.
There isn't a single work that represents my production. I'd rather refer to a series of them, since because of the way I produce, single photographs are not important, for they function as a whole. I'd have to mention the exhibition I did in Dabbah-Torrejón (2006). I think it was the one that best summed up the production process that I'd used. This exhibition was based on the connection between the photographic process (my field of action and intervention), the concept of chance, the dimensions represented (time and space) and its perception by the viewer. The exhibition consisted of a series of 360º stereoscopic photographs plus two installations containing stereoscopic photographs taken in different urban environments. All of them were made with cameras that I have specially designed and built, and that generated certain optical effects that couldn't be perceived with a naked eye. The objective of the exhibition was to show, question and think upon the limits of perception, not only natural, but technological. As a photographer, I continuously deal with the representation of space -forced to reduce it to two dimensions- and the capture of a certain limited time lapse. The exhibition was useful to me to reflect upon the researches made in order to try to expand such limits. I tried to provide the viewer with some clues or tools as to understand the process behing the images, process that, sometimes, can be very complex.
2. In general terms, how would you suggest to approach your work?
I don't think there's a way to understand or perceive my work, and I'm not talking about readings or interpretations. It is rewarding when someone finds certain signs or hints left there intentionally, and that allow him to recreate the processes or intentions that I had thought of when creating the work. It is enriching, at the same time, when someone interprets one's own work in a different way from the one I would've expected, providing me with visions from angles I never would've thought of. I think that, in order for this connection to come true, the viewer must have some level of commitment and dedicate the work a little bit of time and effort to achieve a better understanding. This may be a problem in most of the cases, since many people go in and out of exhibitions in rollerskates. I'd tell these people to focus only on the 360º photographs.
3. In reference to your work and your position in the national and international art fields, what tradition do you recognize yourself in? Who are your contemporary referents? What artists of previous generations are of interest to you?
I don`t recognize myself as a member of any particular tradition, many of my influences are not related to the artistic field or are in the limits of art and science, like Fox Talbot, Arthur Batut, George Lawrence, Aedward Muybridge or Harold Edgerton. I consider myself a traditional photographer, and therefore most of my influences come from such a field. It’s difficult to think on 100% influences. Other artists have influenced me in a complex way, or their influence is not always evident; others have works that I admire although their influence may not be direct. To give some names of contemporary Argentine artists: Ballesteros, Iasparra, Macchi, Siquier, Gordín, Travnik, Joglar, Larrambebere, Ziccarello, Pombo, Di Girolamo, Provisorio Permanente, Vitali.
4. Choose works or exhibitions from the last ten or fifteen years which in your opinion were very significant and explain why
I cannot tell whether some exhibitions were relevant to me or relevant to Argentine art as a whole, or to other artists as well. It also happens that I've seen very few exhibitions in relation to the amount of exhibitions opening every week, and that's why I can only say which were the ones that influenced me the most: Gordín in the ICI (2001), "Fuegos de Artificio" (Fireworks), by Macchi, Zeitgeist, by Gabriel Valansi in the ICI, Dino Bruzzone in the Alliance Française (1997), "El plano del espejo", by Ignacio Iasparra in the photogallery of the TSM.