Sources Behind Urban Enigmas

In the making of the zine Urban Enigmas, several books played a quiet but important role in shaping the process.

Nonverbal Communication: Notes on the Visual Perception of Human Relations
by Jurgen Ruesch and Weldon Kees
A study of how people read signs, gestures, and subtle cues.

Shadow Science
by David Webster
A scientific investigation built on extensive photographic documentation and text.

 

Abstract Alphabet: A Book of Animals
by Paul Cox
A playful demonstration of how form and imagination interact.

 

And then there is La Settimana Enigmistica.
1985. I was six or seven, and in the living room of my grandparents’ house there was always a tall stack of these magazines. I think every country has had something similar. What fascinated me most were the rebus. They mixed letters and small images in ways I couldn’t decode at all, yet I found the combination strangely compelling. Even without solving them, there was a pleasure in trying to understand how meaning might emerge from fragments.

What connects all these references is the interplay between image and text, and the idea that photographs are not only meant to look interesting or document reality. They can also invite the reader to participate, to negotiate meaning, to complete what is missing.

These books – and those early puzzles – helped shape Urban Enigmas in that direction.

More details soon.