Photographer Alessandro Celante is the Edge of Humanity Magazine contributor of this photo essay. From the ‘FURYO Project – Possible Utopias’. To see Alessandro’s body of work, click on any photograph.

“The breath, says the origin myth, was the precise moment in which we became human. What was just matter devoid of any meaning, molded to the designs of a creator in his image and likeness, was filled with life and meanings. However, enveloped and impregnated with this humanity, it was no longer possible for us to bare ourselves, the body began to transform itself incessantly, becoming a specter and representation of ourselves and others, in a kind of curse. Like strange bodies, it was up to us to return to the creative raw material, to free ourselves from the skin we live in and to draw up new dialogues from the plenitude of a transfigured nudity, which springs from its own will and imposes itself through its imperfections and uncertainties. A nudity full of contradictions and irrationalities. Subjective bodies amidst the chaos of the eternal principle.” Alessandro Celante

How many layers make up our bodies? How, and in what way, do these layers define us? Do we have autonomy or control over these layers? Is taking off our clothes enough to be naked? Is there full nudity? What relationships can be established between bodies, territories and nudity? How can desire give way to potency in a state of complete nudity and what can be awakened? What utopias reside within bodies that have become dystopian? In Duchamp’s painting, says Robert Lebel, “the nude plays the same role as the ancient skinned men in anatomy books”. It is an object of internal investigation. With these questions, a proposal for an immersive experience is established, without the intention of answering them, but from them generating more questions. Thus, to envision a state of utopia through the plenitude of nudity, it is not done through removal, but through the application of the raw material and a supposed creation in a self-process of “unculturedness”. A ritual, a performance, a sensorial experience in the photographic act. The experiences involved people who do not fit into the hegemonic status of bodies, who for cultural and political reasons are distanced from this ideology, bodies banned and prisoners at the same time, dissident bodies in suspension, dystopian bodies, but which reserve possible utopias within themselves. This experience seeks to look at oneself and proposes the opening to new connections, perhaps ancestral connections, through the body’s contact with this organic matter intrinsic to the countless narratives about the creation of bodies and which can be reshaped to the designs of their own owners. More than an experience, it is an exercise in self-knowledge and belonging.

About Alessandro Celante 

Born in 1972 in the interior of the State of São Paulo, Brazil, graduated in Social Communication from FAAP-SP and postgraduate in photography and arts at the SENAC-SP Center for Communication and Arts, where he researched photographic historical processes. He taught for 8 years photography and Semiotics at Universidade Padre Anchieta in Jundiaí - SP. Alessandro has been working as a graphic designer for 25 years at AUM Graphic Design, a company that owns and develops projects in the visual arts due to the photographic bias, which made it possible to participate in several collective exhibitions, such as twice in the Mostra de Arte Digital - Centro Cultural Pablo de la Torriente Brau, Havana - Cuba and individuals, such as "Les regards Numériques d'um Brézilien". Musée de Baux, Les Baux - France. 2014 creates the experience of "impermanent masks" and its consequences, as exposed in countries such as Cuba, Mexico, Chile, Uruguay, Malaysia, Australia, Italy, Spain, Netherlands as well as the main festivals of photography in Brazil.

All images and text © Alessandro Celante