Solve and coagulate

Solve and coagulate is one of the fundamental principles of alchemy: dissolution and coagulation are the two stages whose successive cycles bring about transmutation through the purification of matter reduced to its essence.

The diverse range of subjects I cover in my photographic work led me in 2012 to experiment with technically simplifying the image in order to create a cohesive body of work. This process involves printing photos taken with all types of cameras (digital and film, in all formats) onto Polaroid SX70 paper using a smartphone connected to an analog printer. The transfer to this medium results in a reduction in pictorial quality, which paradoxically leads to a process of image purification. The Polaroid’s small format and its random nature create a sort of “processing through a mill” that produces photos very different from the original images. However, the Polaroid object constitutes only an intermediate stage in a series of technical reproduction processes. The final stage, begun in November 2023, consists of destroying and deconstructing the Polaroids in order to recover only the emulsion—a thin, insubstantial film— the very essence of photography reduced to its most fundamental form—and applying it to a thick paper substrate.

This final step breaks the cycle of analog and digital stages, all of which produce identical objects: the final object will be unique and irreproducible in the way the emulsion coagulates with its support.

The act of photography itself consists of dissolving reality in order to recast it in the image. In the body of work I have built up—whether through my professional practice, personal explorations, or intimate photography—certain images seem to belong to a specific realm, at the intersection of memory, imagination, and dreams. They weave their own poetic narrative, the result of a solve my subjectivity and a coagula an image that conveys more than just the moment itself.

Similarly, memory operates through a process of dissolution and coagulation: memories erase certain details, exaggerate others, desaturate colors, and reconstruct moments.

The aim of this series is to serve as a source of inspiration for those who immerse themselves in it—one that is sensitive, mysterious, and universal enough to nourish them, allowing them to absorb it into their innermost being and blend it with their own memories.