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INVESTIGATING THE PRESENT
FOTOFO
To try and characterize in a few words the present-day state of photography in Italy would be a rather audacious attempt – one reason being that our country – in contrast to others – has never participated in any project meant to capture our own history of photography. Despite the fact that interest in this form of expression developed intensively right from the beginning, the historical heritage of photography has never been adequately appreciated. One of the reasons for this fact is that our national unity was achieved only in 1871. That is why, during the initial period, photography was pursued in the small states (Piedmont, Liguria, Lombardia, Veneto, Toscany, Vatican, Meridione) and primarily in cities, such as Turin, Milano, Venice, Florence, Rome, Naples, Palermo,in an independent manner ad without any central coordination whatever. The state as such did not exist as yet, but also after 1871 no major cultural interest was apparent and this was still aggravated by a dearth of financial means. All this goes to explain the chronic lack of interest on the part of formal institutions (Italy has no major museum of photography, nor any undertaking that would be co-ordinated by the Ministry of Culture) and authors who succeed in asserting themselves do so solely by appealing to the scanty, but most dynamic part of the critique – galleries of private collectors. The situation today is more complex and panoramic: as illustration we shall mention here only a few names – from famous journalists-photoreporters such as Giovanni Berengo Gardin, Mario De Biasi, Ferdinando Scianna, down to fashion photographers like Giovanni Gastel, Fabrizi Ferii, Giampaolo Barbieri, from representatives of experimental photography, e.g. Nino Migliori, Mario Cresci, Paolo Gioli, up to masters of landscape photography, like Mario Giacomelli, Franco Fontana, Luigi Ghiri, up to extraordinarily capable experts in communication like Oliviero Toscani. But as the above authors are sufficiently known and here we intend to bring out just a minor panorama of Italian photography, we have confined our selection of photographers to the most important representatives of the contemporary development – those representing the future. We are well aware that through our choice we do not offer an exhaustive and complete picture. We simply wish to present a private survey reflecting the diversity of approaches and heteregeneity of a certain stage, relying on experienced, valuable authors (they appear over and over again and provide points of support for the young to which the latter may refer.) Although we have in fact chosen practically exclusively photographers of the last generation, mention is also made here and there of those who have been famous for quite a time now – in order both to point to the historical continuity (a search for new forms of expression does not arise out of nothing – one may not forget the past) and to show that ability of vision and the courage to set out along untrodden paths is neither new, nor a privilege of the young. If there exists any element uniting all the authors, it is the heritage of the historical avant-garde which, however, today no longer exercises a directive role, but only represents a general endeavour inevitably to interpret reality, with stress on personal style. The coming of new media has irrefutably opened up new roads, even though here we have preferred to provide space for all experimental techniques – traditional or digital ones – with emphasis on problems of pictorial speech, where there still exist many white spots. In view of all these reasons, we can take this exhibition as a peep through a key-hole, we can probe, we can search, but above all, we should at least for a while submit ourselves to creativity. If we seriously think of it, the latter is truly the genuine and unique photographic genre and he who understands this, is likewise capable of experiencing a miracle and admiration that had taken hold of our forebears in front of „the miraculous invention“ – Photography.
Roberto Mutti
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