Reportage, 2001

The pencil drawing contained inside a plexiglas case reproduces the frontal profile of a male figure seated in an armchair. In the middle of the case, an empty square, outlined by a photographic frame, simulates the framing of a painting, set down on the knees of the person sitting. In the area corresponding to this framing, a photographic collage applied to the wall features two portraits of the author while he installs a previous and different work from 2000 also titled Reportage (GPO-0846).1 The detail of the hand holding a pencil is arranged so that it looks as though it is the hand of the drawn figure.
The title has two meanings: while on the one hand it refers to the “reportage” (meaning photographic testimony) of another work with the same name, on the other, it alludes to the “reportage” (meaning a series of portraits) of the author by way of actual shots and the drawn stand-in.
As is the case in all of Paolini’s self-portraits, the subject is not so much the author in his specific identity (the figure is essentially anonymous, its face remains hidden), as the Author in a generic sense, which find its raison d’être in the becoming of a work (recalled by the empty frame, the hand holding a pencil, and the photograph taken during the installation).

1 The two black-and-white pictures taken by Thomas Cugini portray the artist as he prepares his solo show at the Galerie Annemarie Verna in Zurich in May 2000.