SANDRA MANN / PEOPLE, THINGS, ANIMALS & LANDSCAPES

People, Things, Animals and Landscapes

by Marta Casati

Sandra Mann shows herself to be dependent, sometimes addicted: customs and costumes of being Man, methodologies and modalities, internal motus and external motus. The universality of a living being of human-animal-faunal-floral-urban aspect lures her and fills her photographic journey. Images multiply and scatter. All the details drawn from reality turn into an opportunity to weave a narrative, to put into effect a possible dialogue.

The tale is neither disclosed nor predictable, nor is it offered up with some hasty being there. Factors of an apparent non-association with the other elements preside over and leave a concrete sign of their passing (waiting to understand how the director intends to move them, alternating and counterbalancing them). All the elements of the puzzle – and the elements they themselves are made of – very slowly come together, until that time still confused and uncertain as to their destiny, and they begin to find some of the answers they were seeking. Mann’s universe must not be outlined or defined. Any possible category or label one might wish to attach or ascribe soon proves to be a nervous and oppressive trimming. Mann’s manifold orientation displays a palpable need to rest upon sure possibility. The possibility of being able to range free and encroach, however and wherever.

Marta Casati, curator and writer based in Milan

from: People, Animals, Things, Landscapes, Galeria San Carlo New Contemporary, Photofestival Milan, Italy, 2007