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The Shape of Memories - Reimagining Time, Space, & Presence

Riccardo Magherini

Riccardo Magherini photographs to rebuild what a place makes him feel. Each image grows from fragments: a flicker of light, a texture, a fleeting gesture, pieced together slowly and guided by instinct. Four series, Bangkok, Hanoi, Circus, and Hong Kong, were born in places where he was a stranger, seeing with heightened awareness.
Bangkok combines portraiture with the life of its streets. Hong Kong becomes rhythm, geometry, and vertical weight; Hanoi rests in muted tones and quiet presence; Circus unfolds in a timeless space of wonder and memory. Firenze, his birthplace, is a woven tapestry of seasons and perspectives, where people melt into architecture. Across these works, Magherini captures presence in the unfamiliar: moments that shift, breathe, and remain alive in memory.

Bangkok

In Bangkok, Riccardo Magherini’s fine art practice turns decisively toward portraiture. His focus moves to people as presences shaped by the spaces they inhabit. Each portrait is deeply connected to its surroundings, allowing textures, light, and objects to suggest untold stories. The streets and interiors are not backgrounds but active elements, framing lives in motion.

Hong Kong

The Hong Kong series shifts attention to the architecture of the city itself. Dense verticality, interlaced lines, and layers of structure dominate the frame, with people appearing small, transient, and absorbed into their environment. Even in portraits, the geometry and compression of the city remain the true subject, shaping movement and perception alike.

Firenze

Firenze, Magherini’s birthplace, is presented as a tapestry of layered memories. The series gathers threads formed over hours, days, and seasons, weaving them into visual carpets where memory and image are intertwined. Figures blend into the cityscape, moving quietly through architecture that needs no explanation, only careful observation.

Circus

The Circus emerges as a place outside of time, a space that is both remembered and imagined. It is filled with gestures, tension, colour, and wonder. Magherini gathers sensory fragments: sound, scent, light, and atmosphere; these combine to create images shaped by emotion rather than fact, building a world that exists partly in memory.

Hanoi

Hanoi reveals itself slowly, with muted tones, soft light, and the textures of time. Magherini follows the city’s quiet rhythm, creating portraits that are intimate and unhurried. People appear as silent presences, defined by small gestures and subtle exchanges. The series lingers in moments that do not call attention to themselves, choosing to remain with them.