Photographer's Showcase: Marina Edith Calvo's La Realta Surreale

photo-eye Gallery Photographer's Showcase: Marina Edith Calvo's La Realta Surreale photo-eye Gallery is pleased to announce a portfolio from Marina Edith Calvo, La Realta Surreale.

Marina Edith Calvo, Left: In Croce, 1996; Right: L'Evasa, 1997
Toned Silver Gelatin Prints, Editions of 7

photo-eye Gallery is pleased to announce a new portfolio on the Photographer's Showcase by Marina Edith Calvo, La Realta Surreale. Calvo's surreal photographs depict men and women interacting with an array of props in fascinating and perplexing ways, often collapsing depth of field and throwing off the viewers' sense of scale. I asked her to answer a few questions for us about her start in photography and what inspired her to create the two bodies of work that comprise La Realta Surreale.

Erin Azouz:     How and when did you first get started making photographs?

Marina Edith Calvo
Lo Specchio di Venere, 1998

Marina Edith Calvo:     I have been under photography's spell since my childhood, in fact my father was keen on photography and he had a darkroom at home. I began devoting myself to photography when I was about twenty; friends and acquaintances of mine commissioned portraits which I realized in rooms transformed into studios with sets and objects to produce an ornamental and glamorous effect. Then the desire to communicate my emotions induced me to express myself in photography. The themes of my research are injustices against women, shadows of human mind, violence against animals and nature. My photography is not faithful to reality, but I prepare imaginary scenarios where I photograph myself interpreting various roles.

EA:     This portfolio is a synthesis of two different bodies of work. Can you discuss the two projects, what they are about, and what inspired them?

MEC:     Le Metamorfosi di Eva is a study of the female world that consists of three series: Come Tu Mi Vuoi is an investigation of the social pressures that influence women's lives. In Casa Dolce Casa domestic objects turn into instruments of torture. Su La Testa examines self-knowledge and will to change. L'Eta' della Ragione is a recent series, the work is a reflection upon passions, prejudices, emotions that sometimes drive men to behaviors that produce unhappiness and the destruction of the environment. In both works I use a symbolic language, ironic at times. Various quotations may be noted in my images.

Marina Edith Calvo, Le Appese, 1999

EA: You achieve wonderful perspectives and engaging interactions between the models and the props with which they are photographed. Can you talk about the process you use to integrate these props?

MEC: The props are practical to the idea and the composition. The objects found in flea markets are often strange and kitsch, I transform them in symbols that interact with the rest suggesting surreal and dreamlike atmospheres.

View the portfolio by Marina Edith Calvo

For more information about Marina Edith Calvo, or to purchase a photograph, please contact Erin Azouz at 505-988-5152 ext. 114 or by email.