Nicoletta Cerasomma
1. Can you introduce yourself and talk about how you got into photography?
I am a fine art photographer based in Lucca, Italy, with a background in staged photography. My motivation for picking up a camera was largely to be able to, in some way, satisfy an itch that I have had in my whole life. I love creating in any way possible. I love telling stories by any means. A camera allowed me to do that in a way that was personally satisfying. I had been studying fashion photography, but somehow the fine art clicked in a way that the other art forms had not.
2. Where did you study photography?
I started photography as self-taught in 1997. While working as staged photographer, I studied fashion and lighting techniques in a famous Italian school where I realized my passion for storytelling.
3. Do you remember your first shot? What was it?
Yes, sure. My first loved image was a landscape of Paris in 1997.
4. What equipment do you use?
I have two cameras and 4 lenses and I always use studio lights during the photo shooting. My images are highly planned and I seek the technical perfection through the use of studio lights. After that, I altered the images to create new narratives as composites, where the past and present coexist. I often spend anywhere from five to fifty hours in Photoshop.
5. What do you hope to achieve?
I hope to find my place in the world of art and be exhibited in the most important galleries.
6. What compliment inspired/touched you the most?
I am very happy when someone tell me that my style is like Cindy Sherman. I don't know why but it is a very touched compliment.
7. What inspires your unique storytelling?
My childhood was filled with imaginary characters drawn from the story of those women who made my community unique. Although some of these characters are based on real people who really did exist, the mystery and the unknown which surround them let public link them to an imaginary world, made up of ancestral fears and archetypes.
In adulthood photography has enabled me to reconnect to my community and now I can find beauty in darkness and decay, as well as the legacy of those women in our identity. My goal is to bring a light to what usually keep hidden and unlock the darkness in us all.
8. What THREE (3) words describe your photography style?
dark, surreal, colorful
9. Congratulations! As the winner of the New York Photography Awards, what does it mean for you and your team to receive this distinction?
I am very happy to be part of this beautiful group of talented photographer and I hope to meet them and the organizator in an event future.
10. Can you explain a bit about the winning work you entered into the 2021 New York Photography Awards, and why you chose to enter this project?
The story was about Teresa Bandettini, one of the most talented eclectic woman of the XIX century. She was well known as the intellectual dancer due to her captivating and touching extemporization performances. Her calling to art was strong and carnal. Her impetuous verses took over her, exposing her naked soul to the response that was always favourable.
I invite the viewer to seek the mystery beyond the appearance, in the broken up image, in the place between real and surreal.
11. How has winning an award developed your career?
At the moment I have some awards and publications on magazine and online exhibitions. I have done some exhibition around the world but as I am an emerging talent I am still waiting for the big opportunity and devolop my career.
12. Name 1-3 photographers who have inspired you.
There are a lot of photographers that I love: Cindy Sherman for her being a pioneer in controversial portraits, Miles Aldridge for the perfect use of light and colour, Brooke Shaden for her ability to transform a portrait into conceptual art and being an excellent teacher. But first and foremost the Italian Guia Besana who have inspired me in so many ways and introduced me the art of storytelling.
13. What was the best piece of advice you were given starting out, by a mentor or your role model?
Tell your version of the story.
14. What advice would you give someone who would like to become a photographer today?
I will say to study a lot the technique and then try to find the way perfect for you. It means to try everything and then pursue what she/he prefer most.
15. What is your key to success? Any parting words of wisdom?
Follow your dreams
16. How do you stay in that space of being receptive to new information and knowledge?
Instagram, newsletter... and reading magazines.
17. Anything else you would like to add to the interview?
Obsessed with colour, I creates visually compelling images. My world is a confluence of dream and reality. However, every image conceals a darker sense of mystery and unease. I explore the complex dualities of life as the perfection and the imperfection, the violence and the stillness, the mundane and the bizarre. What I want to create is at the same time both a dream world and a nightmare where anxiety, melancholy, and boredom seem so beautiful, it is impossible to look away.
Colour is deeply related to symbolism and knowing how a certain colour works can add a lot to an image. While colour can be used in so many way like a visual emotion or a feeling, lack of colour is also an important tool to explore. I often use strong blues, reds and yellows because they touches the real yet the surreal, a fantasy and a dream yet the reality.
Although my fantasy world is glamorous, my photographs have a keen sense of self-awareness and a dark humour, which allow to play within the Fashion genre but not be confined by it.
All of my pictures have one recurrent idea that is a kind of simultaneous attraction and repulsion as you are drawn to the image but at the same time, disturbed by it. Meaning that it is something troubling, that is not pleasant, but by the trick of beauty, you are drawn into it.
