Curator: Maya Anner
In this exhibition, three contemporary Italian photographers present documentary projects on seemingly different topics, which together create a bleak and thought-provoking image of reality these days.
Vincenzo Parisi’s series, On the Edge of Water’s Blues, focuses on the extreme drought in northern Italy in recent years and its particular impact on Lake Garda, a vital resource in Po Valley. Supplying nearly 900 million cubic meters of water annually for agriculture and hydroelectric energy, the lake attracts tourism, supports endangered endemic species, and sustains the fishing industry, alongside its pivotal role in the production of goods manufactured in Italy. Parisi’s photographs serve as an expression of the environmental concerns that extend beyond the lake’s immediate surroundings, and encompass cultural and economic implications in the present as well as in the future. The figures in Parisi’s photographs are portrayed as isolated, passive, and secondary, in a landscape where the lake and its shallow water are the true protagonists.
Paolo Manzo presents a body of work produced over the course of seven years, between 2015-2022, titled Vita di M. Manzo’s work follows Mario, who was sixteen years old when he jumped into the sea, a life-changing affair resulting in his reliance on medication and psychological rehabilitation. Quadriplegia, which Mario suffers from ever since, is a form of paralysis that affects all four limbs, and as such he is closely accompanied by his mother in order to perform mundane tasks. At the backdrop of Manzo’s work is the suburb of Fuorigrotta in Naples, Italy, Mario’s environment, filled with architectural and cultural limitations that contribute to the tragic nature of the work, a story of maternal devotion, resilience, and willpower.
And then Came Winter is a series by Pierpaolo Mittica, photographed in Ukraine, in 2022, at the time of an ongoing war with Russia. After a failed attempt to seize Kyiv, Russia changed its war strategy as winter approached and began attacking power stations. As such, an extreme state of cold and darkness was forced upon the remaining population, left to endure the harsh Ukrainian winter. With more than half of the country lacking electricity, heating, and water, the situation in Kyiv and its suburbs is particularly difficult. The areas destroyed in the first months of the war are continuously targeted by missile and drone attacks on a near-daily basis, and, during winter, the temperatures drop as low as minus 20 degrees Celsius. After two years under an ongoing state of war, a difficult winter is once again imposed upon the people of Ukraine.
Illuminating three distinct narratives, the photographers in this exhibition demonstrate how progress in the 21st century not only does not alleviate human suffering, but in some instances, may even contribute to it.
In collaboration with the Italian Cultural Institute
