i’m thinking to give up photography, finding i can do a better job as a pain in the ass.
unfortunately when starting to criticize, one is reminded that “those who are without sin, let them cast the first stone”. i admit i’m no saint, and i can’t be taken as an example : but this does not prevent me from getting fed up when i see something i cannot tolerate.
today i’ve seen more than enough, and i already am up to here.
for instance i have seen a minister of the italian parliament that was smoking a nice sigarette indoor, where it is prohibited by law, right in front of his bodyguards, policemen and other authorities.
he, or better she can, but we can’t : why?
who knows…
coming back, i crossed one of the most beautiful squares of milan, called piazza santa maria delle grazie.
besides being really beautiful, it is right at the entrance to the site of “the last supper” by leonardo da vinci. which is one of the wonders not only of the local block, not only of Milan, not only of the region, not only of italy but of the whole world.
nearby is a famous private high school called san carlo.
so famous that in milan teenagers who pretend are called “sancarlini”.
round 1 pm mothers of the “sancarlini” come to fetch thetir adored children, and where do they park the big cars they are driving?
no doubt in the middle of piazza santa maria delle grazie, where it is totally prohibited.
japanese tourists queueing to go and admire “the last supper” by leonardo find themselves having to negotiate their way between jeeps, jaguar, volvo, mercedes.
a mad traffic of suv coming and going.
here above is a picture of the square taken with my cellphone, the yellow building on the left is the entrance to “the last supper”.
all right, all together now : mothers of the sancarlini, fuck you!!!!

last night i was in my bed and i couldn’t sleep.
i was absolutely fucking fed up.
i wanted to get up and write these few lines, but lickly i fell asleep, i’m afraid i would have said much more insulting words than what I’m about to say now .
maybe some of you remember a my small modest battle some times ago about the fact that italian creativity is absolutely not promoted in italy.
it is such an old topic that I do not want to repeat myself once again, I’m sure you all know it by now.
i specifically drew you attention to the fact that since franca sozzani became the editor of vogue italia and uomo vogue, never EVER commissioned an Italian photographer for their ediotorials.
never once in twenty years.
this has destroyed a whole generation of italian creatives, swiped away, destoyed.
this month the new issue of uomo vogue came out.
the cover has been assigned (finally!) to a good Italian photographer, he deserves to have that cover.
well done!
a beautiful portrait of tim burton!
finally things are changing?
finally a new course after twenty years of burnt out land?
mah!
well …..
more or less…
i’m not so sure this can be seen like a new beginning:
that photographer, the first to appear after twenty years on the cover of the italian vogue, after barbieri, toscani, mulas, gianni, nadir…this photographer is not just anyone : he is the son of franca sozzani, the editor of that magazine.
and nobody says anything?!?!
and all this remains unpunished?!?!
SHAME, SHAME, SHAME, SHAME

i’ve been reading for a while and with great pleasure and enjoyment the most beautiful italian magazine, l’internazionale.
i do it for my own pleasure, but I cannot deny also with obvious pride i’m doing something not revolutionary, or not from the front line, or not from the third world but simply thinking of doing something rather great.
a good article (self-injuring?) by luca sofri on the same magazine takes away all illusions. i copy and paste it:

“the reader of Internazionale, according to my personal analysis, can be of two types. A type, a normal person that likes it because it is a nice magazine, full of stories and things to read, that explains the world, especially without the rubbish one finds in other magazines. B type, someone addicted to informations, slightly dandy, that likes Internazionale because it cuts a dash without being boring.
let’s come to the topic of today’s comlumn, A type doesn’t kow what a hummer is : he is a normal person. while B type knows. today this column serves A type who will be informed, and demagogic for B type, who will read what he has been thinking for some times (it is not the only one, isn’t it?).
the Hummer was created as a military vehicle by a company subsequently bought by General Motors and used by the americans in the so called Desert Storm operation. then, fifteen years ago – rumors are that Arnold Schwarzenegger insisted – was placed in production for civil use. It is a practical car for challenging operations but horrible, in the presence of those notoriuos SUV look like station wagons, something in between a police cellphone and a four-footed robot out of Star Wars. Naturally the stupidity of the commercial operation attracted human kinds alike, and absurd use in the hurban traffic. Uses a fortune in petrol, and has become a cult amongst rich rappers, modern gangsters and european soccer players.
It could be appreciatesd the commitment of Fergie of Black Eyed Peas, conscience struck for the environment, she placed her Hummer on eBay for sale, and we have reached 63thousand dollars. Surely, down a precipice it would have been spectacular.”

ther are no doubts, i’m am the B type, the dandy.
fuck how disappointing.

ps: but the hummer makes me puke, i hate with all my heart those pranks that buy it. i would send them in the gulags in siberia.
is this enough to be classified non dandy?

i often have ideas
in fact, without boasting too much i have a lot,
maybe sooner or later i will also manage to realize them.
time is too short.
and some of them are so strange, i’m afraid it is impossible to develop them.
like producing cat food with a mouse flavour.
but i have an idea this can be a success.
i want to give it to you for free, surely i will never accomplish it, but maybe someone out threre has the time and the means to carry it out.
this is the concept: to build a prison were you pay to stay.
a real prison, with guards and all, but very well done, with good food, bunk beds with blankets, all must be done like real.
the peculiarity would be that in this prison there are no convicted, only normal people would go there.
i think a lot of people are fed up with going to the maldives, formentera, in all those places. all these people would be happy to go in a nice cell, meditate, read books, i think.
to be obliged to do nothing at all.
and this is not it.
in this prison as i said there are no convicted.
but, in accordance agreement with the government the days spent in such a prison would be considered like a prison sentence, to be deducted in the event of a real conviction.
the result is that someone spends at leasure some days or months in prison, and if he is eventually sentenced, he can shorten the time to spend in prison.
don’t you think this great idea can make us all very rich?

tonight i went to “La Scala” theater, and once again i convinced myself that i madly like music, any kind of music that is good.
fuck how i like music!
i can’t be without it.
i listen to it constantly, always, at home, in the car (at obscene volume…), in the studio ,,,
it is not only an instrument tha can give great emotions, but also an extraordinary thermometer to define a period, an era, it always tells exactly who we are.
i want to make a personal list of music i loved so much and still do.
beside the most recent one, up the the year 2000 to include that representing my musical roots.
in the last few years i’ve loved some singers maybe even more than previous one, but these are the foundations over which i’ve build a big and strong home.
it has been very difficult to select only 12 albums, but this was the number i choose, i left out many, far too many.
also because up to now my itunes has 13.030 songs, for about 1.300 albums ….
these are my final choices :
- joy division “unknown pleasure”. teenagers always have a kind of melancolic spleen, a kind of self distructive behaviour, reading baudelaire while dreaming to drink absinth. mine coincided with this very gloomy record. the cover also a masterpiece.
- tom waits “blue valentine”. i choose this one but i could have chosen any other of tom waits. for instance the great “closing time”. gloomy smoky introspective atmosphere.
- vinicio capossela “l’indispensabile”. if i liked a lot tom waits, would i not like capossela? it is a collection, this is why i choose it, thay are all extraordinary.
- michel petrucciani “live”, what a genius petrucciani! a crippled midget with a genius in his hands. i’ve seen him live twice, once i even went into a kind of trance while listening to his music.
- the cure “seventeen seconds”, the cure are great, and this is their best album. very modern when it came out, very modern still now.
- chet baker “my funnay valentine’. what a genius baker! His voice not masculine, nor feminine ….. he plays the trumpet like a caress.
- david bowie “ziggy stardust”, what can i say …. david bowie!
-fabrizio de andrè “fabrizio de andré vol. 3″. the greatest italian poet. that’s it.
-air “moon safari”. this unknown french arrived in the nineties and revolutioned the music.
-genesis “selling england by the pound”. The music of the seventies becames cultured. the progressive is born.
-neil young “harvest”. beautiful
-pink floyd “wish you were here”. masterpiece.

this is my music, these are my roots.
i have to go now, i’m sorry, i must listen to the last marvellous ben harper…

thank-you, thank-you thank-you, to all of you.
to all those who wrote, phoned, texted, sent telegrams.
and even only thought about me.
speaking about these things on a silly blog makes the blog itself a little less silly, and it shows it becoming somehow more and more a true diary of my public and private life.
but “the show must go on”…
after all the turmoil, i went for a week to sardinia for a job.
it was useful, to work but specially to have a short holiday by the sea.
to look at sunsets, feeling the wind and smelling the sea.
i would have gone for free, but they paid me.
clients don’t read this blog, isn’t it?
now everything starts all over again …. have a good year everyone…