I’ve known Michele for many a year. Since we were kids at play. In the 80’s we created

Valchiavenna’s very first websites together. But I can honestly say via genuine

friendship and affection that I never imagined in those long-gone days the poetic and philosophical side to him that is so clearly expressed today through his passion for photography. 

Photographs bring the mountains ever closer. Alive. Whether it be in winter or more recently this summer when, with only rucksack, tent and camera for company, Michele wandered the full extent of the Valle Spluga, setting out from the Acqua Fraggia waterfalls, and taking in Passo di Lei, Angeloga, Madesimo, Montespluga then down towards Truzzo and back to Chiavenna. What was to trigger his new passion was a fascination with light and the natural patterns created by wind on snow, or indeed the magical, improvised lines traced by off-piste snowboarders. An urge to discover, to engage people’s emotions or simply the thrill of the chase? 

Recent months have seen us take great pleasure in “po- sting” a range of images captured from sunrise to sunset, precisely to share the joy of those moments captured by the artists themselves and see them reproduced for our appreciation in magnificent photographs. As he himself puts it - when he found himself roving around in rediscovery mode - the mountains were not about great peaks, or climbing rock-faces, much more like streams, flora and fauna, animal life and spaces. The tiny, silent details that surround and remain everywhere for us to marvel at. Michele explains: “I realised that the reason I enjoy taking photographs is to take myself almost by surprise, observing all that my home and valley encompass. The reflex is also the best excuse I know to be able to stay on my own when I feel I need to. Taking photographs instead of talking, not forgetting to appreciate things or even to stop looking”.

But photography has also been instrumental in him getting to know others who share the same passion, Daniele Del Curto, Elliot Wild, Andrea Shooter Resta, and also to rediscover old friends like Cesare Contin and Fabio Cucchi to name but a few.

An invitation too good to turn down: sling a rucksack on your back, a camera round your neck and away you go!