| I create erotic images and I enjoy doing so. I especially enjoy this work in Italy where, lately, public morals in terms of sexuality have been affected by a touch of intolerance and censorship, and not so far from the likes of that experienced back in the Middle Ages. Obviously, this is quite hypocritical and contrasts with the actual sexual habits of people these days—days when we can see ice cream ad campaigns featuring fellatios.Over the past two years, the images that I see on the internet at erotic websites for amateurs, voyeurs and couple exchanges have become the primary sources of inspiration for my work. |  |
The Freedom of Censorship -Danilo Pasquali
I create erotic images and I enjoy doing so. I especially enjoy this work in Italy where, lately, public morals in terms of sexuality have been affected by a touch of intolerance and censorship, and not so far from the likes of that experienced back in the Middle Ages. Obviously, this is quite hypocritical and contrasts with the actual sexual habits of people these days—days when we can see ice cream ad campaigns featuring fellatios.
Over the past two years, the images that I see on the internet at erotic websites for amateurs, voyeurs and couple exchanges have become the primary sources of inspiration for my work. The ambiguity and the contradictions found in such images strikes me. The pictures were almost always censored and camouflaged in extravagant ways: butterflies and sunsets, feathers, kittens, planets in 3-D, stamps and a wide array of Clip Art images. Fadings, distortions, solarizations and a variety of filters were used as censors on these sites. Such elements guaranteed the anonymity of the person on the screen, but, still, the objects of everyday use, pieces of furniture and the surrounding environment in general always revealed his or her life and habits.
During the first part of this project, I tried to reveal the involuntary but clear iconographies of this censored world through my own interpretations of it. I began physically enforcing “censorship” during the process of shooting my nude models. At the same time, I emphasized the objects that surrounded him or her and that characterized his or her environment. Censorship slowly turned into my employing a mask, which allowed me to set up a wide variety of narrative choices. By inserting animal masks, I didn’t want the person to imitate the animal he/she was wearing, but instead to evoke its attitude and to play with it. At the same time, I developed a series using reproductions of characters from the Victorian age. In this series, the subject’s identity and the mask’s identity overlap. This particular overlap and identity exchange made me modify my shooting technique entirely. The image became softer, more instinctive and oneiric.
At the moment, I’m working on capturing the erotic aspects of fetishism. The challenge here is finding the right balance between praising the fetish and providing a sense of irony about it without ridiculing it.
The use of masks helps me a great deal in my relationship with the models during the shoots since they are not professionals but are either friends, girls I approach in the street or curious women who contact me through my website. I often have to deal with people who have never modeled before, and it’s amazing to see how wearing a mask makes them change their attitude, immediately overcoming embarrassment and becoming looser, more relaxed and eager to play while interacting with their new identities.
I try to create characters and situations drawn from my own erotic imagery. The use of a certain tone, composition and narrative method for each photograph help me to create images with a unique pictorial touch. Considered together, I hope my images create the illustrations for a book of erotic tales.
