Pagliacci gotici vintage 復古哥德小丑 ヴィンテージゴシックピエロ

La gente del circo appartiene ai cilindri ed ai trapezi, alle scatole e ai cerchi di fuoco, non cammina su linee rette e terreni solidi come noi.

Al circo si va dietro i lazzi, le smorfie, i sorrisi del pagliaccio

come dietro le briciole lasciate da un mago colorato.

Si ritorna tutti alla casa della felicità.

Ricordami come quello che si è messo il naso da clown solo per vederti sorridere.

La vita è un circo ed io sono un pagliaccio:

dispenso sorrisi dietro al pianto truccato.

Life's a circus and I'm a clown: I dispense smiles behind painted tears.

Circus people belong to cylinders and trapezes, boxes and rings of fire, they don't walk on straight lines and solid ground like us.

At the circus, we follow the clown's jokes, grimaces, and smiles as we do the crumbs left by a colorful magician. We all return to the house of happiness.

Remember me as the one who put on a clown nose just to see you smile.

Pagliacci gotici vintage (Vintage Gothic Clowns) is another photo session done on a rainy day at the Venice Carnevale.

For most masked costumers and photographers, it is an unspoken rule that if it is rainy weather, we cancel the photo meeting altogether because rain and floods tend to ruin the costumes. But for a small number of Italian costumers, we continue. This is because some of the local Italians do not live in Venice but took a few hours to get here and only stay for a day or two, so we make the best of what we can and what we have.

Tellarini Valentina and Ilenia Succi Leonelli are veteran costumers at the Venice Carnevale. Like many local Italians, they prefer painted faces to full masked costumes.

The photos were done within the small shaded alleyway for the first part of the photo session, and then just as it started to rain again, we took a few shots in the rain.

As usual, everything done using natural lighting only.

Venice is often photographed beneath soft winter light, wrapped in mist and reflected in quiet canals. But sometimes the city offers something far more theatrical.

Vintage Gothic Clowns was photographed during a rain-soaked day at the Venice Carnevale, when the weather itself seemed determined to become part of the performance.

Against the aged brickwork and weathered walls of Venice, two flamboyant figures emerge beneath black umbrellas. Dressed in vivid acid green and burnt orange, their striped stockings, layers of tulle, exaggerated makeup and tiny hats recall the eccentric world of old European circus performers—yet with a distinctly Gothic twist. Even the little white rabbits dangling from their costumes add an element of peculiar, almost storybook absurdity.

The rain transforms the scene.

Water streams from the umbrellas and splashes around their boots, while the flooded pavement becomes a dark mirror, catching fragments of green, orange and gold. Instead of diminishing the colours, the grey Venetian weather makes them appear even more intense. The performers’ wonderfully exaggerated expressions turn what might otherwise have been an uncomfortable wet afternoon into a moment of pure Carnevale theatre.

There is something deliberately contradictory about the portrait: gloom and humour, Gothic darkness and fluorescent colour, old Venice and playful modern costume. The pair could almost be travelling performers from some forgotten carnival, unexpectedly materialising in a Venetian alleyway before disappearing again into the rain.

For a photographer, such weather can be an unexpected gift. The rain introduces movement, texture and atmosphere that could never quite be recreated on a clear day. Every visible streak of water and every ripple beneath their feet contributes to the storytelling.

Vintage Gothic Clowns is therefore as much a portrait of a particular Venetian moment as it is a portrait of the costumes themselves.

At the Venice Carnevale, even bad weather can become part of the masquerade.

And on this particular rainy day, Venice provided the stage, the rain provided the special effects, and the clowns provided the magic.