ARTIST BIOGRAPHY

Neeko Paluzzi (he/him) holds two masters degrees from the University of Ottawa: a Masters of Fine Arts (2022) and a Masters of Film Studies (2013). In addition, he is a graduate of the Photographic Arts and Production program at the School of the Photographic Arts: Ottawa (2017). He was the recipient of the Karsh Continuum Photography Award from the City of Ottawa in 2021, had a feature exhibition at the Scotiabank CONTACT Festival in 2019, and was the winner of the 2018 Project X, Photography Grant from the Ottawa Arts Council. Paluzzi currently teaches English at the Official Languages and Bilingualism Institute.

Email: neeko (at) paluzzi.ca | Social-media: @neekopaluzzi

ARTIST STATEMENT

Neeko Paluzzi (he/him) is a lens-based artist and language educator who uses translation theories to create inter-textual installations. From music to literature, he is interested in translating other texts – both visual and non-visual – into his own photographic language that often situates his own queer body at the centre of these visual translations. 

This act not only challenges the traditional position of the translator, but also allows Paluzzi to examine his own subjectivity and performativity in the act of translation. In order to overtly or covertly embed his body into his installations, Paluzzi uses digital technologies, such as 3D-scanning/printing and deep-fake algorithms. These photographic techniques create digital doubles of Paluzzi that examine contemporary queerness and identity. Although he utilises technologies that situate his practice within the early twenty-first century, Paluzzi’s art practice is grounded by the rigours of darkroom chemistry and scholarly research, presenting opportunities to explore the history of lens-based art in conversation with other artists and academics, both past and present. 

Paluzzi is drawn to texts which are decades or even centuries old because of the likelihood of various linguistic translations and adaptations into other media. Following the translation doctrine of Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986), Paluzzi is not bound to the original source, but rather focuses on the various incarnations and modifications that have occurred throughout the years. This intertextual approach to translation is non-hierarchical and anti-colonial, and places equal importance on all versions of a text.  To Borges, a pure translation does not exist and each translation is a mirror that reflects the translator who created it. Paluzzi chooses to stand directly in front of this mirror in order to reveal a new layer of himself with each translation installation.

REPRESENTATION

Currently, Neeko Paluzzi has selected prints/objects available through Patel-Brown Gallery in Toronto, Canada.