The Italian Cultural Institute in Prague hosts a new stage of the exhibition ‘Italiae.Dagli Alinari ai maestri della fotografia contemporanea’ (Italiae: from the Alinari to the masters of contemporary photography) to illustrate the charm and diversity of Italy, its landscapes, its creativity and its people. Curated by Rita Scartoni and Luca Criscenti, the exhibition was originally conceived by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation and produced by Fratelli Alinari Idea SpA. It is on display at the Italian Cultural Institute in Prague from 20 May to 23 June following exhibition in Forte del Belvedere in Florence in 2021 and in Kiev, Strasbourg and Skopje in early 2022.
An archive of 75 photographers – from Gianni Berengo Gardin to Paolo Pellegrin, Gabriele Basilico to Gian Paolo Barbieri, Luigi Ghirri to Mario Giacomelli and Ferdinando Scianna, to name but a few – who have portrayed the Bel Paese each in his own way and with the his own peculiar interest. A century and a half of history is on display in an extensive collection of photographs, creating a gallery of portraits and memories which bears witness to Italy’s rich variety of experiences and the extraordinary vitality of its photography at the same time.
The exhibition is divided into three sections – Landscapes, Works, Faces – each successfully constituting an ideal geographical, historical and artistic experience, capturing in a multifaceted variety of themes the mutations of a continuously evolving country: North and South, city and countryside, work and holidays, tradition and innovation, social history and cultural life.
The Landscapes section sees Italy from unusual perspectives, reinterpreted by the participatory and engaged view of great masters of photography to tell the story of a landscape that is both recognizable and changeable at the same time.
The work of man is the focus of the second section, revealing creative Italy in its tumultuous evolution: from the macaroni factory to modern experiments in the biomedical or aerospace sectors.
The last section of the exhibition is dedicated to an ideal reinterpretation of the great tradition of Italian portrait photography, with different faces and figures by era and region, age and social class, captured and described at school, at work time and at play; individual subjects or in groups, static and in motion.
For more information, go to : iicpraga.esteri.it.
