The title is: “A beautiful place”
To get to the heart of his story, Alessandro Mallamaci gives us two points of reference. The first is geographic: “The valley of the Sant’Agata river nestles in the red land of the Aspromonte mountains in the province of Reggio Calabria and flows towards the sea until it plunges into the Strait of Messina. The name of the waterway originates from the Greek aghatè, which is linked to concepts such as beauty, goodness and nobility; as if travellers from the Magna Graecia period had been enchanted by this place.” The second is sentimental, a kind of afterword to clarify the title of his work: “This is my landscape. I cannot help but love it. It is a beautiful place.” An unasked-for explanation which highlights, from the very first image, his deep bond, but also a conscious and painful one, for a beloved landscape.
Now the journey can begin. We are in Calabria, in the places where Mallamaci lives. Places which contrast sublime landscapes and building speculation, uncontaminated nature and nature corrupted by man and his stories, historic remains and industrial waste, popular traditions rich in charm and the rule of the ‘Ndrangheta. Contradictions, as he himself points out, are the leitmotiv of this area of Italy, and Mallamaci has been moving and working between these alternations for five years. He seeks the proper distance for his photography, one which allows a dialogue between details and wider visions, people and things, to build an itinerary which develops upwards and into which – almost a pause – horizontal visions are inserted.
(from the text by Giovanna Calvenzi)
Las imágenes de Giorgio Dellacasa, pertenecientes a la segunda generación de fotógrafos occidentales que arribó a la isla entre finales del siglo pasado y nuestros días –entre los que se encuentran Martin Parr y, sobre todo, Alex Webb– se inscriben plenamente en la denominada fotografía callejera, o eso podría parecer. Sin embargo, el condicional es obligado, ya que es preciso incluir ese instinto de viajero auténtico que mueve al ser humano a la comprensión y la inclusión, al tiempo que rehúye toda forma de depredación, incluida la depredación visual de la que a menudo está impregnada la fotografía callejera.
Así, en los breves textos autógrafos que acompañan el libro y lo transforman idealmente en una especie de cuaderno ilustrado y nos permiten adentrarnos en los entornos neurálgicos y periféricos de la capital de una manera no invasiva.Empezando por el título, en el que se habla de intercambio de miradas– se trata realmente de una conversación y no de un monólogo, con todos los matices que, aplicados a la gramática fotográfica, sugieren una conversación amistosa.
Las luces suaves o filtradas pulen los tonos e invitan a la intimidad; las amplias y nítidas zonas de sombra marcan quizá un silencio impenetrable, estableciendo un límite a nuestra presunción; la proximidad o distancia con los individuos, así como sus gestos, miden el espacio de interlocución y admiten distintos grados de confianza. Además, al estar presentes en varias imágenes, los encuadres semisubjetivos o «naturales», como los definía Luigi Ghirri, además de guiar la mirada, nuevamente actúan como elementos discursivos, ya que introducen breves pero agudos comentarios al diálogo.
En definitiva, Giorgio Dellacasa no habla de La Habana, habla con La Habana.
(desde la introducción de Laura Manione)
Photographs of well-composed objects, but with something odd, which makes them like surreal and extravagant toys. However, without any dramatic tension, without any disturbing atmosphere. Even the black and white seems subtle. And the composition is balanced, perfect, as only a master of still life, which Mario Cucchi undoubtedly is, can do. Even the title, C’est la vie, has something merry, but with a bitter hint.
(from the
introduction by Gigliola Foschi)
The city that Giuliana Mariniello chooses to depict, in fact, is the one that the eyes perceive: characterized by scaffolding covered with tarpaulins decorated with advertising images or by reproductions of the hidden architectural structure; it is the space punctuated by billboards placed against the background of the buildings; it is public vehicles disguised with decals. Her photographic transcription of this environment, which we almost always perceive unconsciously and without committing ourselves to look in order to understand, is reinterpreted through a selective framing and with the judicious use of the Matisse tradition of à plat, so as to radically transform the proxemic relationships between the things represented and to arouse new meanings, frequently full of irony.
(from the introduction by Massimo Mussini)
There are places where the past and the present meet and almost merge into a plot whose charm is hard to resist. The rain wets the car wind shield with small, boring drops, transforming it into a screen on which the images flow in black and white full of an ancient attraction. The photographer's gaze crosses it to linger on a landscape whose geometric rigour he captures: the bridge that defines the horizon has the imposing solemnity of a church facade but the image becomes dynamic in the lower part crossed diagonally as it is by the line of the parapet that runs along the Naviglio. Today the rare passers-by pay a distracted glance to that iron, those tie rods, those bolts. Yet these elements still retain the signs of an ancient civilization where iron represented modernity, the strength that knew how to resist the ravages of time, the challenge to the future, the same audacity that still characterizes the arches of the railway stations. Andrea Calestani approaches the Navigli with the curiosity of someone who has already experienced Milan in distant years but who is now rediscovering it when faced with places he had never visited.
(from the introduction by Roberto Mutti)
Susanne Martinet proposes an inexhaustible research work. The body, embodied, lived, discovers, feels, vibrates. For me it was an awakening, on the surface and in the bowels. It requires a constant presence, listening and willingness to meet, with oneself and with the other, be it an object, a material or a person.
The rigor that Susanne requires during her work allows access to a complex dimension, which holds limits and possibilities together, a practice of feeling, of knowing that needs its own time. It becomes research, which never ends, which holds different languages together, for this very reason it requires an awareness above all in detail.
One detail changes everything, Susanne tells us.
The photographs were taken during the summer internships and meetings; I, a student, felt the need to snap, to stop what I felt and lived with my body, with my whole being. They are images that attempt a balance between inside/outside, trying to connect the inside with the outside.
They have no intention of defining, of cataloging, but of opening up a possibility of reading, a point of view.
The idea of the project, born and shared in a choral dimension, evolved into a book. We felt the need to broaden our research: Susanne's work is Susanne herself, every detail tells about her and how every shape, object, movement of light is part of her sensitive gaze on the world, curious and open to amazement and how it is necessary to make it part of the narrative.
(from the introduction by Michela Liverani)
Juxtaposing elements from different realities was one of the cornerstones of the surrealist movement, which adopted Lautrément’s phrase – “the chance juxtaposition of a sewing machine and an umbrella on a dissecting table” - as the manifesto of a new aesthetic based on disorientation and contradiction. By including remarkably incongruous objects in their works, these artists aimed to challenge our expectations, to free the mind from what it already knows and from automatic mental associations. Each of Fausto Meli’s photographs also contains an anomalous element; but in his case, it is neither particularly incongruous nor ostentatious. In fact, it is sometimes so unobtrusive as to be detectable only by paying close attention to the image. The unexpected elements in this artist’s works have a connection with what is shown in the photographs, (futuristic building, a castle on the sea, an old library, a volcanic island...); he creates encounters that have the power to generate new beauty, open up new meanings, new reflections...
(from the introduction by Gigliola Foschi)
Six-monthly magazine.
172 pages, format mm 220 x 300.
The publication is aimed at an audience of professionals photographers, artists, gallery owners, amateurs and operators of cultural sector as a source for further study, debate and anticipation of creative trends.
Cover © Phillip Toledano
Editoriale
UOMINI SENZA CORPO
di FRANCO CARLISI
Portfolio
Phillip Toledano
UN ALTRO MONDO
di GIUSY RANDAZZO
Cornelia Hediger
GLI OGGETTI-PONTE
di ENRICO PALMA
Petra Basnakova
SE DIO VUOLE
di ENRICO MONCADO
Ilaria Sagaria
IL MUTEVOLE MANIFESTARSI DELL’ESSERE
di PATRIZIA SOMMELLA
Marius Schultz
NELLA DIFFERENZA DELLO STESSO RIFLESSO
di SARAH DIERNA
Nicola Buonomo
I LUOGHI, LA GIOIA
di ALBERTO GIOVANNI BIUSO
Siân Davey
THE GARDEN
di DANILA BERRETTI
Alberto Castro
DEL TEMPO E DELL’ESSENZA DELLE COSE
di OSCAR MEO
Nicolas Henry
IL PALCOSCENICO DEI MONDI VISSUTI
di MARCOSEBASTIANO PATANÈ
Silvio Canini
COSA CERCHI, ILMARE
di LOREDANA CAVALIERI
Andrea Angelino Catella
VIVERE NELL’INVISIBILE
di GIOVANNA GAMMAROTA
Close up
Franco Carlisi intervista
Lucia Bonanni
BDC (Bonanni Del Rio Catalog)
Premi
Premio Gente di Fotografia
Angelo Formato
Premio MIA-Welcome to my unknow by Erik Kessels
di ATTILIO LAURIA
Premio Raccont’arti
Alessandro Calabrese
di VITTORE BUZZI
Festival
Biennale della Fotografia Femminile di Mantova
di GABRIELLA CORBO
Fiere
MIA Photo Fair 2024 - XIII Edizione
di MARIA GRAZIA TERRANA
Mostre
Ivo Saglietti
NOMADE SGUARDO
di TIZIANA BONOMO
Mimmo Cattarinich
BACKSTAGE
di SIMONA LORENZANO
Incontri
Rosita Percacciuolo
LA FOTOGRAFIA TRANSFIGURATIVA
di PIPPO PAPPALARDO
Libri
Mario Cucchi
C’EST LA VIE…
di GIGLIOLA FOSCHI
Giorgio Dellacasa
LA HABANA. Fotografie da una città che ricambia lo sguardo
di LAURA MANIONE
Gabriele Cecconi
ELEGIA LODIGIANA
di MARCO UNIA
Francesco Finotto
NOTTE A NORDEST. LE FABBRICHE IN SCENA
di MONICA MAZZOLINI
Gianni Maffi
HORTUS CONCLUSUS
di GIGLIOLA FOSCHI
Punctum
UN RACCONTO DI ANNA FICI