FotoGrafia 2009

Declinations of Joy. Taking photographs: visions and portrayals

The eighth edition of FotoGrafia - Rome's International Festival, will be held from May 29th to August 2nd 2009. The Festival is sponsored by the Municipality of Rome's Department of Cultural Policies and is produced by Zoneattive, with artistic direction by Marco Delogu. This year once again the festival takes place under the Patronage of the President of the Republic and the Aegis of the Ministry for Fine Arts and Cultural Activities and is sponsored by Baume et Mercier.

This year's theme, "Declinations of Joy. Taking photographs, visions and portrayals", arises from a desire to regain possession of photography as action and content, as well as the happiness and the emotions this generates and that at times are lost between the drama of reportage and the glamour of fashion photography.

This year the Festival presents a new format with its heart at the Palazzo delle Esposizioni which hosts the official exhibitions and events. The Festival also includes the traditional Circuit of art galleries and bookshops which is more concentrated and presents even more qualitative work, thanks to the all operators have been invited to create one single exhibition for the festival. The objective is to avoid a dispersal of time and locations and allow viewers to see all FotoGrafia's exhibitions and events in just one week from May 29th to June 6th.

In addition to the exhibitions, at the Palazzo delle Esposizioni, from May 29th to May 31st, it will be possible to enjoy a rich programme of encounters and screenings for a photographic non-stop event lasting from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. The artists present include Japanese photographer Rinko Kawauchi, for the second time in Italy after the exhibition in Milan in 2006. Don McCullin returns presenting a preview of his most recent work entitled "Roman Frontiers", dedicated to testimonies of the Roman empire at its most extreme boundaries. Nan Goldin, winner of the 2007 Hasselblad Award, who in addition to meeting viewers will present "Heartbeat", a video installation in which four synchronised screens show photographs of friends, lovers and borderline scenes from life, accompanied by an original soundtrack by the English composer Sir Jon Tavener, entitled "Prayer of the Heart".

Furthermore, a series of documentaries on the maestros of Italian photography, including Ferdinando Scianna who will be present to attend an encounter with the public. The foreign Academies present slideshows by the best contemporary photographers in their respective countries. A meeting with Euvgen Bavcar, a sightless artist, who will talk to journalist Emanuela Audisio about the subject "Photography, the joy of a hostage of the shadows", preceded by a documentary and a selection of his images. This is the artist's first visit to Italy and this event will include an exhibition within the framework of the ‘Circuit', at the B>Gallery, (a project curated by Obiettivo Granieri).

Finally the programme includes a series of meetings with curators, photo-editors and photographers, among them Davide Monteleone and Alessandra Mauro, Eva Frapiccini, Eric Kessel, Bruno di Marino, Christian Sinibaldi, Juliana Beasley and Melanie Mc Worther from Photoeye.

Thanks to Letture Portfolio (May 29th - 30th - Open Colonna, curated by Officine Fotografiche), which this year will also include an award, there is an opportunity for new photographers to present their work to the most important Italian and international operators, among them Alessandra Mauro (curator, Contrasto), Laura Serani (curator, Rencontres de Bamako), Mario Peliti (publisher, Peliti Associati), Francesco Zanot (critic and curator); Erik Kessel (publisher, Kesselskramer); Martino Marangoni and Alessandra Capodacqua (Fondazione Marangoni).

During this Festival opportunities to take part playing a leading role are many. Among them, as part of the Circuit, the project entitled "Dimensione massima 10x12" organised by 3/3 and Camera Oscura, inviting everyone to send a photograph telling intimate and daily stories, with a format no larger than 10x12 cm, then shown in an exhibition at the Pigneto opening on June 4th. There is also "1x1000" at the Sala uno, an exhibition for which a thousand photographers have been asked to send an image portraying Joy.

One new experience in this sense is entitled "in between - 60 hours in Rome", in cooperation with the Tuscan Photographic Workshop. There is a selection open to everyone, at the end of which 40 photographers will be chosen to portray 60 hours in Rome (Friday May 29th  - Sunday May 31st). This project will be concentrated not on the city's historical centre, nor on the extreme suburbs, but rather in the area between the Ring Road and the Railway Line, an area in which the monumental merges with construction speculation, where the working-class suburbs change thanks to the arrival of students and immigrants and the soul of the city is more powerfully perceived. The result will be an event with screenings of 10 images by each artist on June 6th and the publication of a catalogue in cooperation with Blurb.com.

The idea for "in between" was inspired by the new production entitled "Rome, the city in the middle" created by the South African photographer Guy Tillim for the Commissione Roma - Anno VII. After the success of Documenta / and of Avenue Patrice Lumumba presented at the Henri Cartier-Bresson Foundation, Tillim challenges the Eternal City. This work of art consists in 20 colour images, with a cold and detached light, in which there is a distance between the monumental and everyday life.

Rome is also at the centre of the exhibition entitled "Hidden Rome" by Ecuadorian photographer Geovanny Verdezoto, winner of the IILA - FotoGrafia Award for young South American photographers. Verdezoto has created his project on "los que se fueron", the communities of "illegal immigrants" in Rome, portrayed with large panoramic pictures in bright and lively colours. This year too, the Italian-Latin American Institute (IILA) and Zoneattive, in cooperation with the Centro Cultural del BID (Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo), have sponsored a second edition of this award, and the best work will be presented at an exhibition at the Palazzo delle Esposizioni where the winner will be announced. There will also be an exhibition held at the Institute.

FotoGrafia 2009 also presents the recent project by Giorgio Barrera, "Through the Window", a reflection on European identity starting with the normality of  people's lives, portrayed from the exterior of their homes, as if observed through a window. An exhibition created in a dark space with coloured light-boxes that thanks to detectors light-up as people walk by, just like many windows in the night. This project won last year's edition of the FotoGrafia - Baume & Mercier International Award, and the winner of the third edition will be announced during the Festival. Confirming Baume & Mercier's increasing commitment to photography, the programme also includes the exhibition "The Photographer" by Gerard Rancinan, 23 portraits of the greatest living photographers, already successfully shown at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris.

This year's main exhibition is a collective by over 30 photographers, and entitled Joy, entirely created with screenings and videos in a fully immersive journey of visual and sound references. This exhibition is the result of a call for proposals published online and inviting photographers to present original work linked to this subject. Hundred of ideas came in with a final selection that indicated an excellent international generation of talented photographers, among them American Gus Powell, Juliana Beasley from England, the young Polish artist Kuba Dabrowski, South American Alejandro Chaskielberg, Italian Filippo Romano, German Jorg Brueggermann, author of the Festival's image this year. These are photographs portraying the simple and profound emotions of the human condition in its most intimate dimension, and among them also the work of the great photographer Bernard Plossu. 
Through this exhibition we also wish to introduce the public to new ways of enjoying photography, as happens with Mutations II "Moving Stills", which ideally precedes it in the exhibition, presenting videos and installations by 8 artists: Nadine Hilbert and Gast Bouchet, Olga Chernyscheva, Matteo Peterlini, Ori Gersht, Jutta Strohmeier, Tuomo Rainio, Peter Aerschmann and Cristoph Brech. This exhibition is sponsored within the framework of the European Month of Photography, and includes a Catalogue with a DVD, being held in Rome after  Vienna, Berlin, Bratislava, Paris, Luxemburg and Moscow.
The group of exhibitions for FotoGrafia 2009 at the Palazzo delle Esposizioni, ends with the exhibition entitled "From the soul to the body. The Russian Caucasus" by Davide Monteleone. This is a project that in 2008 allowed this artists to win the first edition of the FotoGrafia-Libro Award, the Festival's section devoted to the presentation of the best photographic book published in the course of the previous year and that this year too will be held with dozens of new publications.



FotoGrafia - Rome's International Festival; May 29th - August 2nd 2009 Palazzo delle Esposizioni


www.fotografiafestival.it

FotoGrafia. Rome’s International Festival
8th edition
Künstler. Direktor: Marco Delogu

Künstler: Künstler. Direktor: Marco Delogu

Künstler: Rinko Kawauchi, Don McCullin, Nan Goldin, Ferdinando Scianna, Euvgen Bavcar, Guy Tillim, Geovanny Verdezoto, Giorgio Barrera, Gerard Rancinan, Gus Powell, Juliana Beasley, Kuba Dabrowski, Alejandro Chaskielberg, Filippo Romano, Jorg Brueggermann, Bernard Plossu, Nadine Hilbert, Gast Bouchet, Olga Chernysheva, Matteo Peterlini, Ori Gersht, Jutta Strohmaier, Tuomo Rainio, Peter Aerschmann, Christoph Brech ...