Daniele Buetti

DANIELE BUETTI (Fribourg, Switzerland, 1955).
“Shining,” 2005.
Perforated C-Print in a light box.
Includes a label from Galería Distrito 4, Madrid, with reference number DBI11649.
Measurements: 101 × 80 × 10 cm.

Created in 2005, “Shining” belongs to one of Daniele Buetti’s most recognizable series, in which he reworks images from the worlds of fashion and advertising through punctures and backlighting. This process alters the photograph’s flawless surface and transforms an image associated with the contemporary ideal of beauty into a physical, vulnerable, and ever-changing presence. This reflection on the mechanisms of seduction in visual culture constitutes one of the central themes of his career.

Here, puncture takes on both a formal and conceptual role. With the light off, the tiny dots barely disrupt the photographic surface; when the light is turned on, it passes through the C-Print and creates an intense concentration of light around the figure’s body and hand. Buetti thus transforms the image into a source of light, contrasting the apparent perfection of the portrait with a manual intervention that alters and destabilizes its meaning.

The “Galería Distrito 4” label is particularly significant in relation to the piece’s history. In 2005, the Madrid gallery dedicated the solo exhibition *The Venetian Mirror* to Buetti, at a time when the artist was gaining significant international recognition.

Daniele Buetti is one of the contemporary Swiss artists who has most consistently explored the relationship between identity, desire, fashion, and mass culture, using photography, installation, video, and light boxes. In 1999, the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía dedicated the solo exhibition *Could a dream be enough* to him, which focused on the tension between consumerism and the individual’s emotional needs. His work is also represented in collections such as the Fotomuseum Winterthur, the Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, and the ZKM in Karlsruhe.