Embrace by Paolo Ventura (source: Courtesy of FORMA Gallery)
EVERY November, hundreds of photos flood Bratislava during the Month of Photography. This year, along with presenting the latest developments in photography in Central and Eastern Europe, the festival will focus on Italian photography.
To create a comprehensive picture of Italian photography, the organisers are bringing five exhibitions presenting its historical and current trends.
The exhibition of Oliviero Toscani, known worldwide for designing the controversial advertising campaigns for the Italian brand name Benetton, will be the highlight of this section. The presentation will be unconventional because Toscani is not a photographer whose work is typically found in galleries and museums: there will be 50 billboards, 2x3 metres in size, on display on Hviezdoslavovo Square.
While Toscani will represent contemporary Italian photography, i.e. the period from the 1990s to the present, photos from the 1950s-1960s by Mario Giacomelli will represent the history of Italian photography and the transition period from classical documentary photography to photography that is much more subjective.
Paolo Ventura, known for his ability to create atmosphere by building small model scenes in his studio and taking pictures of them, will represent the younger generation of Italian artists. Bratislava will host his Winter Story, a kind of memorial to his childhood in northern Italy.
The collective exhibition Young Italian Photography will show the latest trends from the Italian scene.
The fifth exhibition will mark the 40th anniversary of the invasion of Czechoslovakia by Warsaw Pact troops. It displays photos taken by Alfonso Modonesi during his two-week visit to Czechoslovakia in October 1968.
The exhibition of works by German Thomas Höpker from the Magnum agency will be another highlight of the photo festival.
Slovakia will be represented by a display of photos by Andrej Bán, Jozef Cincík, Daniel Fischer, Karol Kállay, Viktor Kopasz, Otakar Nehera, and Miriam Petráňová.
The program traditionally offers portfolio reviews, workshops, concerts fusing images with music, the Sittkomm awards, and a conference on Italian photography (with a lecture by Oliviero Toscani).
The Month of Photography; November 3–30, 2008; Exhibition venues in Bratislava; www.sedf.sk
