Bibliophile
The Bibliophile series brings together a body of work where the book serves as the central object of research, explored through its materiality and sculptural body. The volumes used in these projects carry their own histories of circulation: they are the results of family inheritances, loans (that were never returned), petty thefts, or finds from second-hand bookstores around the world. From this heterogeneous collection emerge investigations that explore the physicality of the printed word, branching into sub-series such as Annexes (since 2014), in which books act as "tombs" that delicately house photographic clippings and paper fragments. In Bibliomancies (since 2013), the process is guided by chance: appropriating the ancient oracular practice of opening books at random, the artist prints self-portraits onto the selected pages, creating an unforeseen dialogue between his own image and the revealed textual content. The same medium serves the series The Hanged Man (2014), where the image of the artist's body is printed upside down over the text, evoking the XII Arcanum of the Tarot to suggest a state of suspension and sacrifice. In these works, the volume operates as an open reliquary that, when handled, reveals these grafted images, asserting itself as a living organism—subject to cuts, insertions, and resignifications.
Bibliomancy, 2013
Photo-Object (1x1m)
The Bibliomancy series, begun in 2013, appropriates the ancient oracular practice of the same name, which consists of opening books at random to seek omens in the selected passages. Guided by this element of chance, the artist intervenes in scavenged volumes by printing self-portraits directly onto the revealed pages, establishing an unforeseen and at times ironic dialogue between his own image and the pre-existing textual content. In these works, the book acts as both a sculptural body and an open reliquary, where the fusion of the printed word and the human figure generates new narratives.
The Hanged Man, 2014
Photo-Object (1x1m)
In the work The Hanged Man, an interpretation of the XII Arcanum of the Tarot, the artist transforms the open book into a kind of gallows: it is upon its pages that the figure's feet are fixed, while the rest of the body projects dizzyingly outward. This visual operation inverts the hierarchy of knowledge; it is no longer the subject who masters the object of reading, but the book itself that sustains the body in a state of sacrifice and vigil. The piece problematizes erudition and cultural memory as structures of tension that keep the individual in suspension. It demands an inversion of one’s perspective on the world so that, within the stillness of this penance, new meanings may be constructed.
Appendix, 2013
Photo-Object (various dimensions)
The Appendices series originates from books brought by the collectors themselves, who commission the work. The process begins with a conversation to understand the significance of the volume in the owner's life, serving as the basis for selecting other photographs and objects from their personal collection to compose the piece. The artist then intervenes in the book, inserting these artifacts and merging them with various other images and documents that have no direct relation to the collector. This fusion fictionalizes the original biography, transforming the book into a device that rejects the idea of memory as an "attic"—a static warehouse of memories to be merely stored—and instead operates as a "factory": a space of invention and creative production where the past is re-edited and expanded to generate new meanings in the present.