Customer Reviews

Ornela Vorpsi: Nothing Obvious

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This is a brilliant collections of female nudes from a non-traditional perspective. The photographer does not fall into the usual traps of "the body as sculpture" or as a sexual object on display. These images are not intended for male voyeurs, but are more a reflection of how women actually are and how they inhabit there own bodies. If you're looking for Richard Farber or David Hamilton, this is not the book for you. If you are interested in exploring a vision that does not pander to sexuality, but simply acknowledges it, this is an excellent place to start.

I'll borrow this essay written by Gianni Romano for Zoom magazine, it was helpful to me: "How can we but agree with Ornela Vorpsi: nothing's obvious anymore. The relentless search for new ideas should probably not be associated with the fine arts, and even photography at this point - like the more traditional media - continues to surprise us with its ideas rather than any technical advances. It is here that we must begin our renewed search for beauty, the one we had lost sight of among the pixels that inundate our daily lives.
Born in Tirana, Albania, in 1968, Ornela Vorpsi studied art at the Brera Academy in Milan before making her home in Paris. Her first monograph Nothing Obvious, published by Scalo, is one of those books which seems destined from its first edition to find a place on contemporary photography's shelf of top hits, in company with Richard Billingham's Ray's a Laugh and Martin Parr's Boring Postcards.
Nothing Obvious is a book of female portraits and self-portraits. In most of the images the women are seen alone and in empty spaces that are between being interior or exterior, memory or substance. The models are not professionals but simply friends of the photographer, friends who are presented as "badges" of personal experience rather than objects for study. There is, in fact, nothing in any way passive about their poses: the girls are the protagonists of their own spaces, and in spite of their being nude, we are unable to observe them with a seductive eye. Although the images are not without a certain sensuality, they provoke more than anything thoughts of one's own past experiences, as is the case with Francesca Woodman's work as well."

nothing obvious of ornela vorpsi is a great book. this kind of picture is really rare. the emotion of this picture brings you closer to woodman's photography even in complitely different language.
the images are denseand strong. she is a real artist!

I haven't written a review on any of the books I have bought from amazon, but this book deserves it. I saw no artist value in this book. The pictures look like they were taken from a digital camera from 1992 - terrible. The lighting is uninspired as are the subjects.

The "nude framed in a window" offers some interest, but it's been done and done better. Outside of that, Vorpsi's habits of unfocused lenses and lighting so dim as to leave little for the camera really do nothing for me. Then when lighting and focus let me see the model at all, I see bony rib cages reminiscent of sacks of antlers. I've sometimes gotten rid of photo collections I found in poor taste. This time, the reason is poor photographic craftsmanship.

-- wiredweird

I'll borrow this essay written by Gianni Romano for Zoom magazine, it was helpful to me: "How can we but agree with Ornela Vorpsi: nothing's obvious anymore. The relentless search for new ideas should probably not be associated with the fine arts, and even photography at this point - like the more traditional media - continues to surprise us with its ideas rather than any technical advances. It is here that we must begin our renewed search for beauty, the one we had lost sight of among the pixels that inundate our daily lives.
Born in Tirana, Albania, in 1968, Ornela Vorpsi studied art at the Brera Academy in Milan before making her home in Paris. Her first monograph Nothing Obvious, published by Scalo, is one of those books which seems destined from its first edition to find a place on contemporary photography's shelf of top hits, in company with Richard Billingham's Ray's a Laugh and Martin Parr's Boring Postcards.
Nothing Obvious is a book of female portraits and self-portraits. In most of the images the women are seen alone and in empty spaces that are between being interior or exterior, memory or substance. The models are not professionals but simply friends of the photographer, friends who are presented as "badges" of personal experience rather than objects for study. There is, in fact, nothing in any way passive about their poses: the girls are the protagonists of their own spaces, and in spite of their being nude, we are unable to observe them with a seductive eye. Although the images are not without a certain sensuality, they provoke more than anything thoughts of one's own past experiences, as is the case with Francesca Woodman's work as well."

Maybe I missed something, but to me this book is a collection of outtakes that should have stayed out -- proof that, if you have the right credentials and/or know the right people, you can get anything published. Or it's Vorpsi's practical joke, making us buy something that's total [nonsense] because we don't understand it (because there's nothing there to understand), and therefore making us think we are lacking, rather than the artist.
Bottom line: Save your money.