There are people who sometimes by choice or much more often by a series of misfortunes and adversities find themselves losing everything and living as outcasts, homeless and without income, a borderline existence on the streets of the city.
In the eyes of those who pass by them, these people are often invisible because their sight is disturbing, and it seems to me that those who find themselves in this condition, out of some sort of restraint, do not like to be looked at, and a fortiori photographed, even if they then place themselves or leave their belongings in full view and in busy places.
As a photographer, I cannot but respect this desire, out of human pietas, and because it would be too easy, by forcing my hand, to obtain ‘strong’ but also banal images.
To give an account of this condition of invisibility in plain sight, I have therefore preferred to obtain partial images, some limbs or a posture, or to photograph the objects, often arranged in a maniacal order, and precarious shelters that some charitable association makes available to them, and which form real camps in many recesses of the city.
It was only when I was expressly requested to do so that I directly portrayed a person who wanted it, and who gave me a beautifully self-ironic image of himself while using an estate agency flyer as a fan.
