Fotograf Magazine

The work by Danilo Correale – an Italian artist living in New York – is
inspired and deals with the phenomena associated with the late capitalism
culture and neo-liberal system of labour. Although his work is not medially
anchored and includes paintings, installations, photography and videos,
it is dominated by new media. To the author, however, media are not
important as information carriers but as visual and textual means of
communication that convey his views on the current economic-political
system. Correale’s photographs sometimes show gestures and postures
seen in high politics or financial top management. This is the case of The
Future in their Hands (The Visible Hands, 2012) and the Cat Bond Gang
(2013) photo series. Both the projects include detailed photographic
cut-outs of body parts accompanied with text. The first series shows the
palms of six influential men from the world of politics and finance, captured
in gestures reminiscent of oaths or vote. For the second series, the artist
took photographs of shareholders of an important insurance company. To
protect their personal data, he left out the faces and used only the closeups
of necks in tight ties. None of the projects is purely photographic. In
The Future in their Hands, Correale collaborated with an Indian prophet
who tried to read the palms of the six men to define their characters that
seem to be lost behind their work roles, making crucial decisions on behalf
of the institution whose power they use. To take pictures of the necks
in suits in Cat Bond Gang, the artist bought a share of a company that
allowed him to take part in shareholder meetings. The pictures of the necks
in suits are completed with colourful rectangles – always matching the
tones of the ties – and texts evoking advertising slogans. In the context of
the pictures, however, the slogans sound ironic and they would even seem
amusing if they did not express sad truths: “Not all of us have to pay their
debts, just some of us do” or: “Telling the truth is revolutionary”.