Back to the seaAlessio AndreaniENIT

The hours in between

Ten years after Pakistan, still in black and white, still on film.

Every day one sunrise, one sunset, and the hours in between.

Nobody talks about those hours: the drives, the coffee, the light that may or may not turn up, coming home without the shot. And yet they are most of the time. They are the trip.

I started photographing them on film, in black and white, with no project in mind. I only wanted something of those hours to be left.

Nothing remarkable happens in them. A woman looks at her phone while a cow drinks from the trough. Old men sit on the steps of a church. A boy waits alone at a table. Nothing happens. That is why I took them.

A cow drinks from a stone trough; in the foreground a woman in a white sweater, seen from behind, looks at her phone.
01
An open kiosk on a deserted seafront promenade; behind it, the headland with the lighthouse.
02
Behind a bar window a boy waits alone at a table; outside, a waiter crosses the street carrying a tray.
03
A house front with a shuttered door and a stairway climbing beside it; at an upper window a figure can just be made out.
04
Men in front of a church doorway: one stands reading, the others sit on the steps and on a bench.
05
From above, the white flank of a church and the road running beside it; one person sits alone on the low wall.
06
A bearded fishmonger in a beanie stands behind a counter full of fish; the market carries on behind him.
07
A concrete esplanade above a pebble beach; four distant figures and their long shadows.
08
A pitch-dark tunnel; at the far end, backlit, the silhouettes of three people at the opening.
09
On the seafront a man in a wheelchair talks with three men standing; behind them, the harbour and the mountains.
10
A glass bus shelter alone in the grass, facing the sea; a white house in the distance.
11
A man in a cap throws food to the gulls from a pier; a dozen birds wheeling around him.
12
A wind-bent tree, alone in the fog.
13
Seen through a stone arch, a boy sitting on a doorstep; in front of him, a cobbled street.
14
A harbour with boats hauled ashore and the town clinging to the hill; a man leans on the railing, looking down.
15
Behind the glass of a shelter, a woman stands waiting next to the timetable board.
16
A square with a pool and the fountain mirrored in the water; beyond, houses and one figure leaning on the railing.
17
An old man in a flat cap, walking stick in hand, sitting on a bench in the shade of a tree.
18
A pergola at the end of a street: two men, one standing and one seated; behind them, the bell tower.
19
Inside a distillery, a man leaning against a row of numbered casks.
20
Four people sitting on the rocks look out to sea; behind them, the village bell tower.
21
On a street, three men: one walking in the foreground, one leaning on the railing, one eating seated on the low wall.
22
A woman reads in a camping chair in front of a doorway, her legs stretched out.
23
A cove among the rocks; on the strip of sand, one tiny figure.
24

Then there are the others, grouped by what they have in common.

Who I meet

A shepherd, seen from behind, adjusts his hat in the middle of his flock.
A woman gets into a car on a street lined with parked cars.
A stone courtyard crossed by washing lines; a woman walks between the sheets.
Portrait of a man in a cap and dark jacket; behind him, the seaside town.
A woman, seen from behind, faces a row of pigeons perched on the railing; across the river, the dome of St Paul's.
A group of people listens to a guide under the arcades; behind them, the courtyard with the striped columns.
On the seafront a man with a child, someone sitting on the rocks and a woman standing, looking at the sea.
A woman walks down a shaded alley; at the end, the square and the town hall in the light.
A woman standing against a graffiti-covered wall, next to a poster.
In a wooded park, an old man watches a game of boules; the other players wait for the throw.
Three boys sitting in a rowing boat still on the water; behind them, Vesuvius.

Who else is waiting

Three old men at the corner of a square: one standing with a stick, two sitting on a bench.
Two people at a café table on a terrace, backlit; below, the sea and the mountain.
A man sits on the steps of a colonnade with his bag beside him; the columns recede into the distance.
On a beach, a man crouching in the foreground and another sitting further off.
Seen from above, two sunbathers lying on deckchairs on a rock platform above the water.
A hotel lobby: a woman sits in an armchair beside a pushchair, the desk in the background.
Two people sitting at the tables of a beach kiosk; behind them, the sand and the sea.
A garden with a white house; three men sitting under a pergola.
A man standing beside an open door, at the corner of a cobbled lane.
A woman leaning on a railing looks at the sea, beside the white wall of a house.

Where I end up

A passage between two painted walls; at the far end, in the light, a figure in a courtyard.
An empty waterfront: two people sitting far apart, the city on the far shore.
In a station, the nose of a train in the foreground and one person walking on the platform alongside.
A shaded courtyard among the rooftops; above, a church dome in the light.
Under a railway bridge, the silhouette of a man walking against the light.
A beach kiosk with a Nenetta sign; in front, two people at the counter and two empty deckchairs.
A very narrow alley in shadow; at the far end, high up, the town hall tower.
A concrete building seen from above, one lone figure at the bottom of the ramp.

When I just look

A gnarled tree in the fog, thick trunk and low branches.
Dune grass in the foreground, the beach and the sea; mountains in the distance under a clouded sky.
From the top of a wall, two figures look out at the cliff and the sea.
A boat pulled up on the shoreline; on the cliff behind, a tower.
The coastline seen from above: dark sea, white foam, a strip of land.
Wet sand run through with rivulets, a few dark stones on it.
A riverbank under the trees; to the right, the bridge and the moving water.
The bay with Vesuvius behind, rocks in the foreground and someone diving in.
A wave breaks over the jetty; in the distance, the coast in the haze.
Mud and sand: a pattern of dark veins on a pale ground.
The mastersThe prints I keep at home and the books I have worn out.Keep going