“The earth is 4.6 billion years old, man arrived at most 200 thousand years ago. We must realize that for our planet man is just a blink of an eye in his long history. We should look at nature without necessarily putting man and his needs at the center”. Paolo Cortini.
The geologist Paolo Cortini, founder of an organization that deals with naturalistic tourism and scientific expeditions, has been studying for years the places where nature has maintained its characteristics of grandeur and primordiality, such as Iceland.
He carried out research in Materials Science at a spin-off company of the University of Milan and then worked on reclamation systems on sites contaminated by hydrocarbons. He was among the authors of the documentary Karahnjukar – The paradoxes of development, denouncing the environmental, cultural and financial impact on the Icelandic society of a hydroelectric and iron and steel project.
Here is his comment on the relationship between photography and science, a theme debated during the conversation with Armin Linke on May 16th in Lugano.