Michel Di Moro is a Belgian-italian photographer who has been based in Berlin since 1998.
His early urban and interior photography positions him, photographically, as a “ neutral beholder”, a distant observer of social life with a touch of poetic irony and the keen gaze of a theatre director.
People are described or sketched as though waiting for something that never arrives. Aimlessly, they stand in places they neither truly inhabit or move away from. Occupying "liminal" spaces, they seem at once uprooted and enclosed, unable to reach out or even break free.
Nomads, wanderers, travellers, musicians, sometimes children, this kaleidoscope of characters is as jumbled as puppets in a theatre.
Some of the faces, like theatrical masks, are sad reflections of the places that greet them.Recently, Michel has been experimenting with studio techniques, the results displaying the same control over artificial lighting as that seen in his outdoor work. His portraits question our ideas of beauty and aesthetic sensibilities.
His abstract pictures explore other dimensions and realities, with the interplay of light, shadow, and lines suggesting a symbolist and abstract approach.
Michel’s work also draws our attention to what might be called “urban traces” a “public outdoor narrative” or urban semiology. This taxonomy of extern signs is comprised of wall tags, graffiti and painting traced on cobblestones and windows.
Next to these, are images of rubbish and a variety of other discarded, untidy and messy objects.Beauty in decay? Or has beauty herself her own decadence?
”Taking photos, helps us, as much as words and sounds, to understand and conceptualize the world”. Michel Di Moro