Of the work of Franco Vaccari (Modena, 1936-2025), the tendency towards the concealment of the author is considered; for the writer, the artist's entire research seems to revolve around this concept. What are normally the fundamental components in the construction of an image - photographer, camera, subject - are undermined at the base through the disappearance of the author. Vaccari eclipses himself, leaving a mechanism in operation that replaces him; the camera and the subject thus find themselves in dialogue in the absence of a thinking direction. “Leave a photographic trace of your passage on these walls” (Venice Biennale, 1972) is perhaps the work that most emblematically sums up what is argued in this essay. The disappearance of the author generates chaos, chance and contradiction.