Liminal state:
a state of being between one's past and future identities
and thus outside the established order,
in a state of possibility
(Rebecca Solnit, 2001)
Using this words, in her book Wonderlust, Rebecca Solnit defines the liminal condition. Explored and firstly used by the english anthropologist Victor Turner, the Liminal being identifies a transitional state and so the social drama, as a source of creativity, the place for new ideas, the ritual of evolution and progress. Therefore, applying this concept to the analysis of urban space underlines the existence of a city liminal dimension given by its transformation processes. Space acquires a suspended identity, a temporary passage in the field of pure potentiality: "a state of possibility", and thus, open to new configurations and approaches.
Napoli Est is an urban area deeply signed by the end of industrial age, where liminal spaces are, more often, space of undefined latency. A place where urban transformations materialize trough slow processes and where a permanent asymmetrical negotiation between legal an illegal stakeholders drives the city to a growth without development.
This work is a visual journey trough Naples East. The documentation and exploration of liminal space in this project, aims to identify a specific liminal urban imagery, and to produce source material useful for creative transformation strategies devoted to urban spaces.
The photographic work is configured as a selection of shoots made in Naples East between 2007 and 2011,
the video is taken from the train that leaves the city by the east side in 2011.
Installation:
Artist book: LIMEN
32 pages, color print on photographic paper, dim. 380mm x 240mm, edition of 2
all photo: Danilo Capasso
Video: Sliding Limen
Digital video, Color(PAL), 04'20", 16:9/1920x1080, .mov
direction/editing/sound design: Danilo Capasso
Artist websites
www.danilocapasso.eu
www.napoliest.it
Danilo Capasso
