“My first magic lantern was my bedroom in Ravenna, where the lights coming through the shutters formed ghostly and mysterious figures on the ceiling and walls. Since then, my real magic lantern is my studio.”
For Paolo Roversi, photography is “an endless childhood”: “The photographer lives with that uninterrupted enthusiasm, that constant wonder and curiosity, similar to those of children who discover the world and play with everything around them; but above all with the constant emotion of experiencing and discovering again your own desires, dreams and fears. Because, deep down, photography is a magical game.”
Born in Italy, Paolo Roversi moved to Paris in 1973. Since then he has worked for prestigious magazines (Vogue Italia and France, Egoïste, Luncheon…). His career has been marked by his collaborations with the greatest fashion designers, in particular Yohji Yamamoto, Romeo Gigli and Rei Kawakubo for Comme des Garçons.
Since his years of apprenticeship, the choice of the studio, the large format camera and the Polaroid defined the way of working and the aesthetics of the photographer, who has successfully adapted to digital photography. Almost fifty years have passed. The magic remains. As in these portraits that defy reality to celebrate the presence of Natalia Vodianova or Kirsten, her “angel of light.”
In the Palais Galliera there are 140 works sublimated by the artistic direction of the master. Paolo Roversi’s exhibition is a rare wonder because, while it immerses us in a soft darkness, it illuminates each visitor with a special light. These presences beautify the look. And the cruel times of fashion are softened in these paintings of emotion and character. His models seem to come from beyond.
Lettres sur la lumière, a series of epistolary exchanges with the philosopher Emanuele Coccia, expands on this extraordinary immersion: “I like to think of the photographer as an astronomer who, in his own way, is capable of seeing the world from a different angle. Even if he is framing a simple face, a flower or a small corner of the world, he is always scrutinizing and observing the entire universe with all its laws, always on the lookout for new constellations, for the unknown. Perhaps he is unconsciously searching for an unattainable truth, the soul of the world and everything. Roversi infinite. A lesson in grace.
