Expressing Your Vision - The Square Mile and Vittorio Veneto

Sunday afternoon: I’ve convinced my wife that relaxing by Santa Croce lake is really a nice activity, but it is hot as well. 

So we come back home and, guess what, I pick my camera(s) and decide to go for a walk, south side of the square mile. There are 35 degrees  Celsius.

Vittorio Veneto is a bit unusual: many years ago there were 2 villages, Ceneda and Serravalle; the two were put together in order to be districts of one small city called Vittorio Veneto.

I live between the two districts, in the center of Vittorio, that is not Ceneda (south) nor Serravalle (north).

I am in Ceneda’s boundary now.

The single line railway lays down between the mountains and the city, all along the west side, just near buildings and houses. 

The big, historical, thermal & spa center is one of the old buildings beyond the railway, and is shut down since the 70s.

Once these steps were the access to the thermal center: now they go into the railway’s fence.

I look for compositions that will best express my idea: the fair Vittorio going nowhere.
 

 

 

 

 

 

Expressing Your Vision - Vittorio Veneto and The Square Mile

I live in the center of Vittorio Veneto, a small town in the province of Treviso.

Vittorio Veneto is situated along the edge between the plain and hills, a few kilometers from Venice (going south) and Dolomites (going North).

You should come here: the location is gorgeous: fields, lakes, hills, mountains are easily reached and the sea is not far.
Vittorio is scattered with historical places, most related to first and second world war.

Vittorio is slowly going to nowhere.

Paradoxically, the location is at the same time a gift and a curse from the sky, because Vittorio is always "on the way" to reach a definite location, but it is rarely "the location". It is not the location for tourism, it is not the location for industrial and/or agricultural operations.

Vittorio is always close to somebody or something that "is more and better".

I live in Vittorio since 2006: I got a job in one of the remaining companies, and my wife as well. We did love the place and living there: we still do.

Nevertheless, I look around and I see shops, business and industrial activities, hotels, restaurants, cultural events, young people, smiles, social life going elsewhere.
There were a big spa, a prestigious theater, some big companies, several glamorous places: where are they now.

I see myself picking the car each morning and getting out of Vittorio (my job is 90 km away now) and going back in the evening. I am not the only one.
My idea of Square Mile is to express the melancholy of living in a beautiful place and being witness of its slow decadence. For this reason I will make photo-sessions looking for examples of this decadence, hoping to be a bit provocative and stimulate a reaction. In the meanwhile I will, as advised, look at practitioners' works: Keith Arnatt  and his  "Area of outstanding natural beauty"  http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/arnatt-aonb-area-of-outstanding-natural-beauty-t13148 was a good inspiration for me; Jodie Taylor as well, with her "Memories of Childhood" http://weareoca.com/photography/photography-and-nostalgia/ .

Expressing Your Vision - The First 13 Pages

I've just gone through the first 13 pages of "Expressing your vision".

My first thought is "...well landed in UK academic world...".

In all my life I have studied in different levels, different discipline (humanistic, technical, artistic, professional, even sports). But always in Italy and a bit in the USA.

It was several years ago, so I cannot say if all the differences I find are related to the considerable lapse of time passed, communication & technology, or if the methods are really different from nation to nation.

I believe it is a bit all of these aspects: how I've seen the study methods applied to my children in the last years  confirms that.

In any case, my understanding is that:

• research and collection of different sources are a crucial point;
• nowadays, phisical books are just a small part of all sources (I should be well aware of it, since I work in ICT);
• Learning is not a serial process anymore and it is multi-source, but, at the same time, it needs a lot of self-control and discipline in order not to be diverted, surfacing  or go out of the edge. As we say in Italy "...knowing so little of many things ends up in knowing nothing of everything..."

 By now I am essentially: surprised, excited, worried, eager to go on.