September 1, 2026
AN ANONYMOUS PASSAGE
— within Blank Spaces
an intimate site responsive installation
by appointment | el Nido by VC Projects, 1028 1/2 N. Western avenue, Los Angeles 90029
An Anonymous Passage — within Blank Spaces developed through repeated periods of observation at Villa Emma in Northern Italy.
The project began with an attempt to look closely at the villa—its rooms, surfaces, objects, light and surrounding landscape. Photographs made during an earlier stay became the beginning of a continuing inquiry. Returning to the villa brought further writing, correspondence, tracings, Xeroxes, observations and a small collection of objects temporarily entrusted to the project.
Over time, the villa became less a subject to be documented than a place through which questions of looking, presence and displacement could emerge.
Presented together, these materials do not form a complete archive or attempt to reconstruct an experience. Some are carefully selected; others remain provisional, handled or unresolved. Letters sit beside photographs. Tracings record surfaces through physical contact. Xeroxes repeat and alter photographic images and may be handled by the viewer. Objects retain their connection to the place from which they came.
Together they form an incomplete field of evidence—an attempt to understand what was seen, what was missed, and what becomes visible through returning.
An Anonymous Passage remains an attempt to see.
The photographs came first.
Made at Villa Emma at six o'clock in the morning on June 26, 2025, they began with the closing of the shutters, the covering of the furniture, and the gradual reintroduction of daylight.
The photographs were then put away.
Nearly a year later, returning to them produced another body of material: letters, tracings, inventories, reports and an imagined archive.
The archive did not produce the photographs.
The photographs produced the archive.
The Artist and the Rural
is a reflection written following time spent at Villa Emma, considering, attention, vulnerability, and what may occur when artistic practice gives way to simply being.