Diari, a project by Martina Cirese unfolds as a series of twenty artist's notebooks mapping a decade of intimate, autobiographical exploration. Created while the photographer lived between Berlin, Paris, and Rome, the work centers on personal encounters and shifting relationships, blending photography, text, drawing, and collage into a hybrid visual diary.
As Cirese transitioned through her late twenties and early thirties, the project paralleled wider cultural shifts, particularly in urban nightlife and counterculture, where once-private experiences became increasingly exposed and consumed online. Against this backdrop, Diari interrogates the boundaries between private and public, memory and performance.
Cirese positions herself not just as observer but participant, describing the work as a response to emotional transitions, including the dissolution of a long-term relationship and the forging of new, transformative encounters. Her photographic inquiry stems from deep personal engagement, as she spends extensive time with subjects before photographing, seeking a mutual exchange of vulnerability. These interactions are compiled into journals that combine images, handwritten notes, fragments of conversation, and drawings, forming a visual language that resists fixed categorization.
Visually, Diari alternates between color and monochrome imagery, often captured in ambient light, lending a raw and atmospheric tone. Scenes unfold in nocturnal settings—nightclubs, private interiors, city streets—where Cirese captures "friends, lovers, strangers" in fleeting moments of openness. The photographs, presented in diptychs, are juxtaposed with flora, interiors, or textual elements, creating a collage-like effect that echoes the diaristic structure. The tone is reflective, sensual, and at times somber, drawing attention to the interplay between emotional exposure and bodily presence.
Technically speaking, Diari is constructed through instinctive image-making and mixed-media processes. Cirese composes the project in A5-sized journals using mixed media paper, acrylic ink, and tape. Rather than relying on a rigid photographic method, she embraces fluidity, capturing moments as they happen and shaping them into physical objects that reflect inner states.
Recognition includes the Prix Virginia Jury’s Choice (2020) and recurring PHmuseum shortlistings (2019–22), alongside PHmuseum/Gomma Grants (2021). Exhibitions span a 2021 residency solo at Villa Pérochon, Niort, and Roman chapters—Embrione (Kina, 2024) and Diari (La Cave, 2025). Cirese also teaches her hybrid method, fostering new voices in personal documentary.
