In 2000, shortly after being discharged from the hospital, Giacomelli created Questo ricordo lo vorrei raccontare (I’d Like to Tell You About This Memory) using photographs taken in 1997. Along with La domenica prima (The Sunday Before), this was one of his final series.

“This is my critical confession, a reflection on life’s adventure, born from the haze of post-surgery and crystallized here as a flow of images between myself and the world,” Giacomelli explained.

“It’s difficult to explain my presence in these last photographs. It feels as though I’ve turned myself inside out, wearing my interiority on the outside. I enter within, emerge purified, and include my face in these images—a testimony to the joy of having been present and of holding onto this memory.”
(Mario Giacomelli, in S. Guerra, La mia vita intera, Bruno Mondadori, 2008)

(Adapted from Katiuscia Biondi’s text)