Life, Desire and Self Pleasure
I. The Secret Dialogue and the Genesis of Pleasure
Life, Desire and Self Pleasure stems from the illuminated shadows of the most honest conversations. It is a visual and emotional investigation rooted in deep listening: a dialogue conducted with different men tied to a continuous process of self-exploration. From the convergence of these voices—and through the mirror of my own lived experience—a truth emerged that is as simple as it is profound: beneath social constructs, daily masks, and the passage of time, we all share the very same primal urge. The desire to please ourselves.
In a world that so often categorizes, judges, or commodifies the human body, self-pleasure is reclaimed here not as a mere erotic or voyeuristic act, but as the most intimate, pure, and political realm of the Queer experience. It is the precise moment when an individual strips away the soul before the clothes, returning to the very essence of feeling.
II. The Syntax of Time: 24 Frames per Chapter
The project is structured with a framework that is both rigorous and fluid. Each chapter is dedicated to a different person and consists of 24 photographs—a numerical sequence that deliberately echoes the rhythm of life: the 24 hours of a day, the 24 frames per second of cinematic motion, the measure of a complete cycle.
Documenting these moments across various times of the day means capturing the ever-shifting nature of desire. Intimacy knows no set schedule: it can surface in the raw morning light, in the torpor of the afternoon, or within the solitude of the night. These 24 images thus become the visual chronicle of an extraordinary spark: the exact instance when the mind takes control, commanding the body into movements that transform into a continuous flow. Thoughts become tactile, abstract fantasies materialize into glances, goosebumps, broken breaths, and gestures that turn imagination into reality.
III. The Synesthesia of Color: Mapping Emotion
The true catalyst of this narrative is the conceptual and intuitive use of color. Color does not serve as a mere aesthetic ornament or a superficial design choice; rather, it acts as a genuine chromatic translation of the subject's mental state at the exact moment of the shot.
Through light, color becomes raw emotion and living matter:
- Red The visceral urge, the flesh, the fever of desire, and the heat of blood accelerating the pulse.
- Blue Deep contemplation, cathartic solitude, the sweet melancholy of ecstasy, and the suspension of time.
- Yellow Electric energy, the clarity of a sensory awakening, and the bright light that reveals and celebrates skin without fear.
As the chapters unfold, the viewer is guided along an evolving chromatic path. Every shade represents a turn—a milestone along that colorful road defining who we are, what we desire, and where we are steering our identity.
IV. The Immediacy of the Queer Gaze
The concept of Queer is the common denominator, the invisible matrix binding every chapter together. There is a threshold beyond which words become insufficient, reductive, or even an obstacle. The goal of this project is to cross that threshold.
Through immediate visual perception, photography speaks directly to the viewer's eyes and gut, bypassing any need for rational explanation. Life, Desire and Self Pleasure does not seek to explain what Queer intimacy is; it aims to make you feel it. It is an invitation to shed prejudice and recognize oneself in the universality of an intimate gesture, discovering that within self-pleasure there is no isolation, but rather the highest form of freedom.