nthWORD Photog Viola Muscinelli on Censorship

Viola Muscinelli is the daughter of the famous Italian photographer Fernando Muscinelli (of record label RCA). She learned the basics of her craft from her father, blowing herself up multiple times in his studio when she was a child. Here's the story behind Viola's image in nthWORD.

What's the craziest thing you've done while pursuing your craft?

I had the idea for this image one day during fashion week in Paris two years ago. It's a very stressful period if you work in the industry, so I found a way to be aware for a few minutes, to take care of my creativity.

There were all the general managers and clients and PR people in the offices. I woke up at 5 am and by 10 pm I was so tired and bored that I closed the door to my office, put some raspberry candies that my boss brought me from Denmark on the scanner, put my head inside and pressed "scan." The result was quite nice, so I published it on Flickr. It was a success. Lots of people commented on the image, and I was very happy about that.

What are your thoughts on freedom of expression?

I'm very concerned about freedom of expression. First of all, I'm Italian and we are living through a very sad moment with the current political situation. Due to Berlusconi's government, all artists -- especially actors and comics -- are censored and asked to leave if they "attack" his political views. So there's no freedom and satirical programs are censored as well.

On the other side, a group called "il popolo Viola" (the purple people, because purple is the only non-political color) organize meetings and manifestos against the government on Flickr, facebook and other networks. My name is Viola (purple in Italian) so I'm glad to be a kind of "spokesperson."

What are your thoughts on Flickr?

Well, I started to put some pictures on Flickr as a joke, FB was not there yet and I lived away from my country, so it was a fun way to share my life in Paris with my friends in Rome. After a while I found it touching every time a person I didn't know personally commented on one of my images. This allowed me to make friendships with other artists and also to be discovered by your magazine. I think that there are so many talented people in this world and Flickr is a very useful tool to discover them...

See more photos from Viola on Flickr

posted by nthWORD at 5:51 AM