The hilltop Roman town of Vasto, in southern Abruzzo, overlooks the Adriatic Sea. Seen here is the view from the Loggia Amblingh, a path along the medieval walls that still stand today. Except, that’s not quite what is pictured.
Davide Pitetti was indeed in Vasto’s old town; that morning he had completed a wallpapering job for a local client and he had stopped for his lunch in a small shopping centre. The image in the background is in fact hand-painted on the wall of the cafe.
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“I put my iPhone 7 against a slot machine facing my table and took a self-portrait,” Pitetti says. “I think the result is quite special because those who see it will be forced to stop a few seconds longer than usual to question what they’re seeing. Is this true? Is this real? Is this landscape fictitious or does it really exist?”
In describing his approach to photography, Pitetti invokes AE Housman’s attempt to define poetry. “He used words to the effect of, ‘I don’t know what poetry is but I recognise it when I hear it.’ I don’t know what photography is, but when I feel the urge, I have to use any means I have available to take that photo.”
Reflecting on the image five years on, Pitetti says it makes him proud to be Italian and have such beauty on tap. “I hope the image makes people feel eager to notice all the special things we have around us.”
