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Donna Ruzzano
( Cyprus )

Mixed Media; Photography


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Profile of Donna Ruzzano


Donna Ruzzano

I believe that the fundamental statement of a fine art photographer is the photographic print. It is my record of what I visualize, for that fraction of a second when I open the shutter and light gushes profusely creating a link between the ‘image’ of what is in front of me and the print I create.

For me the concept of one’s identity is the main source of inspiration for most of my photographic work.  I believe also it is one’s vision of self that creates their identity.  I mostly explore my own identity or  the people I hold dearest to me by reflecting upon those issues that affect my/their experience as a female/male , as  a gendered identity which is constructed from historical as well as socio-cultural notions of what is. 

The images that I see through the camera are sometimes manipulated in the darkroom or computer. My objective has always been to explore and represent an image, and not to totally transform it. I find the camera angle from which the subject becomes the absolute most it can be at that moment.  I am most interested not in one’s face or body, or object shape  but to explore the angles, the space,  the reflections, and the light that strike the object. I strive to make forms make sense visually and hope that a multifaceted reading of the image will result.

I began my love of the photograph during my high school years. At the age of 16 I saved up and bought my first 35mm Nikon F camera. I quickly learned that the camera doesn’t see only what the eye sees but it can be encoded to see what one might ask for it to see. Therefore, in my world as a photographer, whether it is film or digitally produced, I have hoped to express my innermost thoughts and feelings through this printed medium. As a photographer and  as a teacher I understand that nothing is stable or even particularly comfortable about photography's relation to the other arts and have hoped in my works and my teachings to use this knowledge to crack open conventional notions of photographic practices ‘posing’ questions of photography's position within contemporary culture.

I am currently starting work that continues this investigation of identity moving from the comfort of inside my studio space to anonymous spaces outside of my comfort zone, photographing those I meet by chance. Over the past years, I have photographed people that I encounter in the streets in America, Cyprus, France and Tunisia.  I hope to be able to continue this project bringing it to exhibition stage by Summer of 2014.

 

Art is to struggle with. To love the art – one must struggle with the creation. (Augustine)


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