Born and raised between Genoa and Nice, Italian photographer Riccardo Bandiera (1973) gravitated towards photography after completing his technical studies. As a freelance photographer, Bandiera developed a delicate aesthetic that focuses on detail. He’s also drawn to underwater photography, sometimes setting it apart in his portfolio. One of his most acclaimed series is Trilobiti, consisting of ten photographs inspired by the literary genius of Breece Dexter John Pancake. The eponymous book stands as a gem in American literature, posthumously published in 1983. His life came to a tragic and mysterious end in 1978, leaving behind a great void. Through these ten photographs, Bandiera crystallizes the present, capturing stillness and silence akin to the fossils – a great passion of Pancake – extracted from the Earth. These images are trapped in an eternal suspended time, as if belonging to a geological era. Each of Bandiera’s shots tells a story, a frozen fragment of life, an ode to Pancake’s memory.

Riccardo Bandiera captures the silent beauty of the marine landscape, yet beyond that, manages to convey a sense of melancholy, an echo of the inner torment that plagued Pancake. It’s as if Bandiera, through the lens of his camera, manages to penetrate the soul of the American author, granting him an eternity through the art of visual immortality.

Courtesy Riccardo Bandiera