| | | |  | | | | Pixy Liao - It's never been easy to carry you. 2013 | | | | | FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA 2019 - REGGIO EMILIA | | | | XIV edition: BONDING. Intimacy, relationships, new worlds | | | | | | | Opening days 12, 13 & 14 April | exhibitions open through 9 June, 2019. | | | | 24 festival exhibitions, 10 exhibition venues across the city, 6 regional partners, over 120 artists, 85 events and OFF Circuit, an extended collective event and creative showcase for professionals, amateurs and upcoming artists that includes over 300 exhibitions. | | |  | | | | | | | | | | 
Horst P. Horst, Mainbocher corset, Paris 1939
Courtesy Paci contemporary gallery, Brescia | 
Larry Fink, Peter Beard Opening,
New York City, November 1977 |
| | | | | | From April 12th to June 9th, Reggio Emilia will host the XIV edition of FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA, the festival organised by Fondazione Palazzo Magnani in collaboration with the Comune of Reggio Emilia and the Region of Emilia-Romagna, with support from the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities. The festival explores all spheres of photography, the art form that best interprets the complexities of contemporary society.
Exhibitions, talks, performances and workshops are highlights of Fotografia Europea, an event never before so rich, which is populated by key figures in photography, culture and knowledge, and hosted across the city's main cultural institutions and exhibition spaces.
Conceived and designed by the Scientific Committee of Fondazione Palazzo Magnani – composed of Marco Belpoliti, Vanni Codeluppi, Marina Dacci, Marzia Faietti and Gerhard Wolf, under the artistic direction of Walter Guadagnini – FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA 2019 is built around the theme of BONDING: Intimacy, Relationships, New Worlds, which will run like a fil rouge through all the exhibitions in the programme. | | | | | |  | | | | Justine Emard – La notte dei tempi – Co(AI)xistence. 2019 © Justine Emard – ADAGP | | | | | | "Among the hundreds of works displayed this year at 'Fotografia Europea'," said festival director Walter Guadagnini, "there is one that summarises all the themes of the exhibition: it is a video produced in Japan by a young French artist, which portrays the silent dialogue between the body of a ballet dancer and a robot, who move together, comparing their differences. That's exactly it. 'Fotografia Europea' enacts the relationships between people, between cultures and knowledge, from an individual and a collective perspective, from the personal to the public. Through retrospectives of great masters of the past, such as Horst P. Horst, and of the present, such as Larry Fink, through exhibitions of Italian masters like Vincenzo Castella and Francesco Jodice, and many representatives of the younger generations, we aim to discover the deep bonds between people, but also bonds between photography and the world".
Once again this year, FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA can count on the collaboration of Region Emilia-Romagna and an increasingly strong national network of synergies, which have led Reggio Emilia into dialogue with some of the most important cultural institutions in the region, such as the MAST Foundation in Bologna, the University of Parma's CSAC, the Collezione Maramotti in Reggio Emilia, the Fondazione Modena Arti Visive, joined by MAR – the city's Art Museum – as well as Osservatorio Fotografico (Ravenna) and Linea di Confine per la Fotografia Contemporanea of Rubiera (RE).
FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA is part of the network SISTEMA FESTIVAL FOTOGRAFIA which, in addition to FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA, brings together Photolux Festival in Lucca, Cortona On the Move, Lodi's Festival Fotografia Etica and SI FEST of Savignano sul Rubicone with the aim of developing shared initiatives, photographic commissions and much more.
The guest country of the 2019 exhibition is Japan. The festival enjoys the support of the Japan Cultural Institute in Rome and works in collaboration with the Foundation Italy Japan. Both institutions have embraced the event, considering it an important opportunity to showcase Japanese culture in Italy. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | |  | | | Horst P. Horst, Lisa Fonnsagrives-Penn, Vogue, June 1940, cm 80x105 cs.
Courtesy Paci contemporary gallery (Brescia – Porto Cervo, IT) | | | | | | | 12 April – 9 June, 2019 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The perfect place to begin a tour through the various galleries of FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA 2019 is PALAZZO MAGNANI, which hosts an exhibition of works by the German photographer and naturalised American citizen, Horst P. Horst (1906-1999), a master of style whose images are widely appreciated for their sophisticated elegance. A beautiful image, curated by Walter Guadagnini and produced in collaboration with Brescia’s Paci Contemporary gallery, presents the milestones of Horst’s life and career, highlighting connections with the festival’s theme, both in terms of biographical events and relations between art and the advertising image. On display are renowned photographs, like Odalisque, and shots for Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar, which made him a leading light of fashion photography worldwide from the 1930s to the 1950s. Also on display are Horst’s portraits of the Parisian artist community in the 1930s – a gallery of intellectual celebrities from Jean Cocteau to Salvador Dali – as well as the colour photographs which attracted appreciation at the artist’s retrospective at London’s Victoria & Albert Museum in 2015. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | |  | | | | Larry Fink, New York Magazine Party, New Yprk City, October 1977 | | | | | | | 12 April – 9 June, 2019 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | A wide retrospective is dedicated to the master of American photography, Larry Fink (New York, 1941), under the title Unbridled Curiosity. Hosted by PALAZZO DA MOSTO, the exhibition displays over 90 images from the 1960s to the present, selected by Fink in collaboration with Walter Guadagnini to interpret through his work the themes of the festival’s new edition. Shot in black and white and of a powerful aesthetic, the show highlights the bonds between people, and people and places, which Fink has captured with ‘unbridled curiosity’ throughout his career. He immerses himself in different contexts, stealing intimate moments and drawing out the soul of the subjects portrayed: the great civil wars, exclusive parties in Hollywood and great museums, country life and boxing gyms. Nothing escapes Fink’s lens. | | | | | |  | | | | Michele Nastasi, Plant Souk, Riyadh, Riyadh, Arabia Saudita, 2017. Courtesy l’artista | | | | | | | 12 April – 9 June, 2019 | | | | Palazzo da Mosto also hosts the exhibition Arabian Transfer by Michele Nastasi, which highlights the transitory condition of six cities of the Arab Peninsula (Abu Dhabi, Doha, Dubai, Kuwait City, Manama, Riyadh), representing them as landing places for people and cultures. In the past decades these places have appeared as new global epicentres, made possible by the hypermobility of people and images, goods and finances. Largely inhabited (and built) by immigrants from across the world, they exist as a living laboratory in which local identity aspirations are confronted with Western models, and the inhabitants’ cultural cleavages. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | |  | | | | Pixy Liao - Holding. 2014 | | | | CHIOSTRI DI SAN PIETRO | FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA 2019 - XIV edition | | | | | | | 12 April – 9 June, 2019 | | | | Following a restoration project that made them unavailable for the last edition, the CHIOSTRI DI SAN PIETRO return as the centre around which the festival revolves: a look to the East. Japan, guest country of FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA 2019, is represented by several artists: young Japanese photographers, showing the newest trends from one of the most relevant, contemporary photographic schools (Kenta Cobayashi, Motoyuki Daifu e Ryuichi Ishikawa) and the narratives of European artists (Justine Emard, Vittorio Mortarotti e Anush Hamzehian, Pierfrancesco Celada) and Asian artists (Pixy Liao). | | | | | | | | | | | | | The Chinese artist Pixy Liao » – recommended by Federica Chiocchetti – joins the ranks as the authentic discovery of the last fashion season; her artistic research intertwines perfectly with the other artists, both generationally and in a shared cultural climate. At Reggio Emilia, Pixy Liao presents for the first time in Italy her project Experimental Relationship (2007 to now), which explores her bond with Moro, a Japanese man five years her junior, through the performance of various situations in front of the camera. The photos explore the alternative possibilities of heterosexual relationships; a relationship in reverse where man and woman exchange roles in sex and power.
The idea that guides the works of Kenta Cobayashi » , curated by Francesco Zanot, is that the photographic image is not at all invariable, as was considered until recently, but that it gives life to an unstable and changing universe. Each image, through the use of digital-manipulation software, can easily reproduce an infinite series of representations. The objective is to obtain a bewildering effect and to use photography as a kind of "portal".
Motoyuki Daifu » presents a series of 20 images from his ironic series Holy Onion, which portrays his mother in the act of peeling an onion in a kitchen, thus giving ironic value to a banal and everyday act.
Ryuichi Ishikawa » , a rising star of Japanese photography, portrays people on the margins: like Mitsugu, who becomes a symbol of well-being and sex in the society, history and culture of Okinawa, from which emerges the conflict between the universal beauty of life and the society created by human beings. | | | | | | 
Shibuya Yellow, #smudge 2018 ©Kenta Cobayashi
Courtesy METRONOM, Modena | 
Motoyuki Daifu, "Holy Onion", 2019
Courtesy of the artist and MISAKO & ROSEN, Tokyo |
| | | | | | The generational and thematic affinity, as well as explicit geographic collocation of her work, created and set in Japan, makes Justine Emard » part of this ideal collective exhibition on the theme of relations between people and communities. The work of the French artist evolves around the alterity of machines. The series La notte dei tempi ("The Darkness of Time") at first glance oscillates between the polar contrasts of technology and spirituality. Video installations and photographs build a bridge between artificial and human intelligence in a poetic and captivating representation, which is surely one of the most peculiar and moving expressions of contemporary artistic research.
Piefrancesco Celada's Japan, I wish I knew your name (curated by Renata Ferri) focuses on Tokyo-Nagoya-Osaka, a megalopolis also known as Taiheiyō Belt, an urban conglomeration with an estimated population of over 80 million people. Despite the incredibly high number of opportunities for encounters, it appears that society is actually moving in the opposite direction. Celada’s project was selected from over 300 projects submitted through an open call the festival organises each year. This year’s jury was composed of Walter Guadagnini, the festival’s artist director, Krzysztof Candrowicz, curator and artistic director of certain European festivals and Ilaria Speri, curator and producer.
Like last year, Fotografia Europea launches a production for the next edition linked to this year’s theme. In 2020 we will see the project L’Isola ("The Island") by Vittorio Mortarotti and Anush Hamzehian, produced in collaboration with the Italian Cultural Institute in Tokyo and Ca’ Foscari University in Venice, and of course dedicated to Japan; a preview will be presented during the current edition. The research is focused on Yonaguni, a small island in the Pacific, and its diminishing number of inhabitants, the only carriers of social and linguistic traditions destined to slowly disappear. | | | | | |  | | | | I wish I knew your name, Japan Nagoya 2009 courtesy copyright Piefrancesco Celada | | | | | | In the meantime, Vittorio Mortarotti » presents The First Day of Good Weather, which refers to the order by US President Harry Truman to drop the atomic bomb on Japan when good weather conditions allowed. From this starting point a photographic narrative unfolds, stemming from a personal loss – the death of the artist’s brother – which he traces all the way back to Japan. It also becomes a physical and metaphorical exploration between what remains (ruins, scraps, found objects) and those who remain (the survivors).
The Chiostri di San Pietro are the venue for the presentation by Francesco Jodice » of the commission on the 2018 edition’s theme, REVOLUTIONS. Upheavals, Changes, Utopias. The photographer worked on the concept of circularity in history, producing the video project Rivoluzioni ("Revolutions"), which draws inspiration from a true story: the last message sent by the Chinese probe Kaiju 2 before disappearing into a black hole. In 1989 China’s space agency secretly sent a probe towards the so-called Event Horizon, on the border of a black hole, where time stops, light disappears and matter collapses, with the goal of seeing what was on the other side. The video strikes the audience with its clever play between reality and cinematic fiction, as well as its surprising use of colour.
Another previously unseen project was born from the encounter between the photographs of Jacopo Benassi » and the dance of two unique interpreters – one able-bodied and the other disabled. The point of arrival, against any pathetic or emotional nuance, is the possibility to express a wider range of virtuous movements within and beyond the recognised canons. The project produced from the collaboration between Fondazione Palazzo Magnani/Fotografia Europea, and the National Dance Foundation/Aterballetto.
The French artist Samuel Gratacap » , one of the protagonists of European contemporary documentary photography, brings to the Chiostri di San Pietro his project on migrations, Fifty-Fifty, produced in 2014 on the Tunisia-Libya border where he met those who half-live – ‘fifty-fifty’ – between life and death. The exhibition tackles the festival’s theme from an explicitly social and political perspective but creates opening for alternative readings.
The project Speciale Diciottoventicinque » , which has reached its eighth edition and is dedicated to training young photographers within Fotografia Europea, returns to the Chiostri di San Pietro. Guided by the new course tutors, the Kublaiklan collective, the participants will create a collaborative project based on the concept of co-authorship, reflecting this edition’s theme and the various practices of image construction. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | |  | | | | Vincenzo Castella, Urban Screen #3, Courtesy l’artista | | | | | | | 12 April – 9 June, 2019 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | In the amazing setting of the SINAGOGUE, Vincenzo Castella, master of Italian photography, displays his latest project Urban Screens, a labyrinthine vision of vegetation at once domesticated and unrecognisable, a reflection on the relationship of contemporary humans with the natural element. Large-format photographs (180 x 226 cm) greet the spectator through the building’s walls, creating an uncanny space where photography reflects on forms of representation, ideologies and iconography. At the centre, two screens present an additional evolution of the visual process, which literally moves through the surfaces and plants: a natural universe tamed, which through photography finds a form of disorderly beauty. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | |  | | | | Next Possible Victims 2018 © Jaakko Kahilaniemi | | | | | | | 12 April – 9 June, 2019 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Every year FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA offers visitors an opportunity to explore the unseen spaces of the city, rarely open to the public. Thanks to this year’s collaboration with the Fondazione I Teatri, the UNDERGROUND TUNNELS OF VALLI THEATRE will be transformed into an exhibition space, hosting the shows of the other two artists selected through open call: the Finnish artist Jaakko Kahilaniemi and the Franco-Armenian photographer Lucie Khahoutian. With 100 Hectares of Understanding, Jaakko Kahilaniemi has created an engrossing conceptual project that explores in depth the composition and meaning of a wild forest area in Finland. | | |  | | | Lucie Khahoutian, Official Portait, Georgia 2017, The tapestry in my room.
© Lucie Khahoutian | | | | | | | 12 April – 9 June, 2019 | | | | Meanwhile, with Tapestry in My Room, Lucie Khahoutian depicts the dichotomy of her worldview, illustrating a comparison between Armenia and France and mixing Armenian visual codes with a more European and Western environment. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | |  | | | | Sinagoga Hurvah Gerusalemme 1988 © Giovanni Chiaramonte | | | | | | | 12 April – 9 June, 2019 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | In the CHIESA DI SAN NICOLÒ and the BATTISTERO, Giovanni Chiaramonte narrates his journey Towards Jerusalem. It is a quest to find his destiny, from the grave of his mother through the places where the history of the West took shape – Athens, Rome, Berlin, the ruins left by totalitarianism and the wars of the 20th century – which culminates in the Holocaust, represented by the memorial in Miami. | | | | | | | | | | | | | In the CHIOSTRI DI SAN DOMENICO, the exhibition Ropes/Corde displays the photographs of Fabrizio Albertini, Silvia Bigi, Emanuele Camerini, Marta Giaccone, Luca Marianaccio, Iacopo Pasqui and Jacopo Valentini, the seven winners of the call by Giovane Fotografia Italiana, a project dedicated to Italian under 35 artists, now in its seventh edition. The photographers, selected by a jury composed of the curators of the exhibition – Ilaria Campioli, Daniele De Luigi, Carine Dolek and Shoair Mavlian – reflect on the theme Ropes/Corde in line with the fil rouge of this year’s Fotografia Europea, understood as a metaphor for different types of bond: as a symbol of union and an instrument to escape, but also as obstacle, hindrance and imprisonment.
Giovane Fotografia Italiana is promoted by the Comune of Reggio Emilia, GAI - Association for the Young Italian Artists Networks in collaboration with Fetart - Circulation(s), Festival de la Jeune Photographie Européenne of Paris, Photoworks - Brighton Photo Festival, Roca Umbert Fàbrica de les Arts - Festival Panoràmic, Granollers (Barcelona), with the contribution of the Region Emilia-Romagna, Emilia-Romagna Creativa and Reire srl.
The Chiostri di San Domenico also host Scatta la cultura, a display of the winning photographs in the competition launched by the Region Emilia-Romagna, with the regional MiBAC secretariat for Emilia-Romagna, the Natural Cultural Heritage Institute Emilia-Romagna, the Comune of Reggio Emilia, Fondazione Palazzo Magnani, Fotografia Europa and Fiaf Emilia-Romagna. Around 40 of the 4,000 and more photographs uploaded on Tourer (the database of the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities) narrate through citizens’ eyes the beauties of architectural heritage and the changes of landscape in Emilia-Romagna. | | | SPAZIO SCAPINELLI celebrates the history of the A.C. Reggiana football team, which was founded on 25 September 1919 and is celebrating its 100th anniversary. Since then a profound relationship has developed between the city and the "Maglia Granata", a unique bond that goes beyond a simple passion for football. A century of victories, defeats, joy and disappointment is narrated in the exhibition Obiettivo Granata 1919/2019 – curated by Giacomo Giovannini and Giacomo Mazzali and promoted in collaboration with Reggio Audace Football Club – through the best shots of the key sports photographers of A.C. Reggiana’s first 10 years. An engaging itinerary from the team’s beginnings to the Serie A, narrated through its protagonists.
SPAZIO GERRA hosts Confessioni. Canzoni vissute, an exploration of the golden decade of the Italian love song in the 1970s through the performers and authors of the "canzone" genre, focusing on the themes of confession and its processes.
Inside BIBLIOTECA PANIZZI, the exhibition Families: A World of Relations revisits the photographic funds of the families of Reggio Emilia. Alongside professional portraits produced for milestone events in family life (Christenings, confirmations, weddings, etc.) the exhibition explores numerous images shot by amateurs, often by the family subjects themselves. Themes include the family studio-portrait, images of childhood, domestic photos and pictures of the public spaces frequented by family members in a mosaic that mirrors the lived experience of Reggio Emilia’s households. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | |  | | | | © Cecilia Del Gatto | | | | | FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA 2019 - CIRCUITO OFF | | | | 300 exhibitions and events | | | | | | | As in previous years, the XIV edition of FOTOGRAFIA EUROPEA is enriched by CIRCUITO OFF, an extended collective event and creative showcase for professionals, amateurs and upcoming artists that includes over 300 exhibitions, independent and self-organised events, promoted by galleries, associations, public and private entities across the province. These enliven the opening weeks of the festival until 9 June, offering visitors a wide selection of talks and conferences by leading Italian cultural figures, workshops, guided visits with photographers and curators, and musical and photographic performances. The Circuito Off programme includes music and performances across the city on the evening of April 27. | | | | | | | | | | | | |  | | | | Oliviero Toscani, United Colors of Benetton, 1992, ®olivierotoscani | | | | | | During the opening days, the city centre and squares of Reggio Emilia host events, a concert, performances, light shows and more. Throughout the weekend the artists and curators will guide visitors to discover the exhibitions. Furthermore, the Chiostri di San Pietro will host three major conferences: the photographer Oliviero Toscani and the director of Sky Arte Roberto Pisoni will discuss the role of photography in contemporary society (Saturday, April 13 at 11 am); Mario Calabresi and Michele Smargiassi on the relationship between word and photography (Saturday, April 13 at 5pm) and Mogol on ties and intimacy in Italian song (Sunday, April 14 at 4pm).
This year sees the return of the space dedicated to independent photography publishing – the PARENTESI book fair – with exhibitions, presentations, book signings and talks. One of the events not to be missed is PORTFOLIO REVIEW at Biblioteca Panizzi, organised with Cortona On the Move as part of the ‘Sistema Festival’, the network of Italian photography festivals of which Fotografia Europea and Cortona On the Move are both members.
Photo editors and national and international experts will be available on April 12, 13, and 14 to review the work of photographers, both professional and not, providing tips and suggestions. Among this year’s readers are Krzysztof Candrowicz (Photofestiwal Lodz), Jim Casper (LensCulture), Chiara Dall’Olio, Claudia Fini and Alice Bergomi for Fondazione Fotografia Modena, Renata Ferri (Io Donna), George King (Unseen), Martino Marangoni (Fondazione Marangoni), Marina Paulenka (Organ Vida, Zagabria), Mario Peliti (Peliti Associati), Arianna Rinaldo (Cortona On The Move), Fiona Rogers (Magnum Photos), Chiara Ruberti (Photolux, Lucca) and Ilaria Speri (curator e producer). The special reader on 12 April is Larry Fink!
Registration is now open to the workshops organized in collaboration with Spazio Fotografia San Zenone. For the occasion, Antoine D’Agata (April 12–13–14), Davide Monteleone and Simona Ghizzoni (May 3–4–5) will be in Reggio Emilia. | | | | | | unsubscribe here
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