On 9 March 2020, Italy entered a lockdown to limit the spread of covid-19. Lockdown was one of the many new words that would soon become common in our conversations, as well as quarantine, buffer, variant. The pandemic has forced us to worry about invisible viruses around us, to completely review the use and sharing of social spaces. In Italy, about 145 thousand people have died from covid-19 and cases of anxiety and depression have increased.
From the moment it all began, the photojournalists of the Parallelozero agency documented in detail what happened in our country and the collective project was born. CoviDiaries, which through different stories and approaches returns a complex picture of our present and perhaps also of our future. “Right from the start, as Parallelozero, we felt the need to create a sort of memory box, to be opened when all this would be over”, declares Sergio Ramazzotti, journalist, photographer and co-founder of the agency, born in Milan in 2007.
CoviDiaries has evolved into an exhibition project, consisting of photos and projections accompanied by the songs from the album Quarantine scenario of the Casino Royale. The exhibition, already exhibited in Bergamo and at the Turin Book Fair, will be at the Fabbrica del Vapor in Milan from 29 January to 25 February. Furthermore, starting from February 3, there will also be four thematic panels in which some experts will discuss key issues to rethink our society after the pandemic.