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A journey through the evolution of photography, which is at the same time a journey through the changes in our country, through the gaze of the most famous artists on the natural, urban and social landscape: “Italy is a desire – Photographs, landscapes and visions (1842 – 2022). The Alinari and Mufoco collections” is the exhibition that can be visited, until 3 September, at the Scuderie del Quirinale. A photographic heritage, the one proposed in the exhibition, with an itinerary of around 600 images: at the centre, therefore, the landscape, “understood as an identifying element of Italian culture, as well as a privileged subject of nineteenth-century artistic experimentation”, but once again the protagonist of the photography of the last 50 years.
The history of the country
On the two floors where the exhibition winds its way, a chronological journey through the history of the country and through the changes in photographic art: it starts with the Alinari collections, with photos from the late nineteenth and first half of the twentieth century, the authorial vision, with works by Vittorio Alinari and von Gloeden, and the period between the 1940s and 1950s, with those signed, among others, by Alberto Lattuada and Fosco Maraini. Particularly evocative, then, is the section dedicated to negatives and experiments, to the first attempts to render the color of images, such as autochromes.
The Mufoco collections
The second part houses the Mufoco – Museum of Contemporary Photography collections and develops through the technical and artistic changes, but also of the landscape itself, from the second post-war period to today: from reportages, with big names such as Letizia Battaglia or Uliano Lucas, to project “Viaggio in Italia”, which was curated by Luigi Ghirri, becoming the manifesto of the “Italian school of landscape”, up to contemporary technologies and research. The landscape is always the protagonist, between colours, perspectives, lights and shadows, which also stand out thanks to a very accurate setting, which presents itself as a further image, with chromatic combinations and natural and architectural subjects, which in themselves create an artistic language . Precisely the setting contributes to underline, with intensity, the technological path, the change of places and visions of the territory over time, openly without wanting to recreate a history of photography or the landscape, but leaving room for emotion and visitor interpretation. And, in this direction, some “sparks” are also added: encounters between photos from different eras, which punctuate the exhibition and give the opportunity for a different look and a comparison, on the evolution of the same landscape and on the fruition of the image. Paula Abenavoli
“Italy is a wish. Photographs, Landscapes and Visions (1842-2022). The Alinari and Mufoco Collections”, Scuderie del Quirinale, Rome, until 3 September