Silence is Sexy

'Silence is Sexy' is an erratic diary on detachment and desire, mapping my own passage through late adolescence to womanhood. I moved to Berlin in March 2015. Attracted by the visionary and nonconformist nature of the city, I found my-self plunged into a primitive and Dionysian counterculture.

As I explored the most transgressive german sex clubs for the first time, to portray and question my encounters became my obsession. Does polyamory fit with contemporary western society? Can hedonism solve the contradictions of monogamy?

Friends; lovers; strangers; figures: these make up the subjects of my research, as they weave their journeys, transitioning from one state to the next, exploring the ambivalence of human desire and experiencing the conflict between ego and reality.

The series combines photos in diptychs from the journals I collected since my arrival in Berlin until today. I took portraits from a displaced metropolis where the days are short and the nights are endless.

© Martina Cirese - Image from the Silence is Sexy photography project
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An unexpected stimulus begets a novel mental state, this comes bracketed between two wavelengths - between the lowest and the highest; between the quiescence of physical stillness and the clamour of thought.

© Martina Cirese - Frozen in the act, as these pictures lay, just like frozen in motion the observer behind the lens remained.
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Frozen in the act, as these pictures lay, just like frozen in motion the observer behind the lens remained.

© Martina Cirese - From the absence of an immediate answer, motionlessness resulted.
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From the absence of an immediate answer, motionlessness resulted.

© Martina Cirese - A state of absolute suspension; the zero wavelength of "silence". The bracket was now opened [
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A state of absolute suspension; the zero wavelength of "silence". The bracket was now opened [

© Martina Cirese - From the Dionysian chaos, the brain sought order, rapidly.
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From the Dionysian chaos, the brain sought order, rapidly.

© Martina Cirese - The sight of unconventional arrangements of human bodies, pressed for explanations.
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The sight of unconventional arrangements of human bodies, pressed for explanations.

© Martina Cirese - A noisy construction of neural bridges commenced, joining the new: "what is" to the old: "what used to be".
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A noisy construction of neural bridges commenced, joining the new: "what is" to the old: "what used to be".

© Martina Cirese - Definitions updated; new answers answered old questions, and new questions emerged.
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Definitions updated; new answers answered old questions, and new questions emerged.

© Martina Cirese - Sanguine blood...rushed in to fill up the thoughtful grey cells.
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Sanguine blood...rushed in to fill up the thoughtful grey cells.

© Martina Cirese - Image from the Silence is Sexy photography project
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What was encountered by one curious eye is now a resulting alley between two mental constructions: the Old and the New. Trapped within these brackets are impressions of a period.

© Martina Cirese - Image from the Silence is Sexy photography project
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As the mind was now occupied by red, a colour which happens to be at our maximum perceivable wavelength. The bracket was now closed, ]

© Martina Cirese - You are invited to experience it, too, as you take a walk between Silence and Red.
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You are invited to experience it, too, as you take a walk between Silence and Red.

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