FotoLeggendo XII edition
FotoLeggendo is renewing itself for the 12th edition by breaking away from the traditional confines of museums, art galleries, and institutional venues to contaminate outdoor areas; walls, public squares, and streets, superimposing and merging them with diverse artistic languages and style.
In the new edition, the exhibitions adapt to the locations, streets and spaces where people live, in particular in the Ostiense neighbourhood where the original site of the Officine Fotografiche (the association promoting and organizing the festival) is located.
Photography sheds its most basic rules and shatters the barriers with street art, collages and glitch art to then be pieced back together in narratives and allusions. The unrestricted nature of urban streets perfectly embraces the blow-ups projected on buildings and walls that draw the attention of even the most distracted passer-by. The renewal meets the modern demands of tearing down the old clichés that define art, and promotes photography to an ever-expanding audience, but it is also attentive to and aware of the inevitable contamination with other forms of expression.
FotoLeggendo, a project by Officine Fotografiche Roma, has always stood out for being transversal, comprehensive and self- financed. FotoLeggendo welcomes collaborations and contaminations because it has always defined itself as a celebration of photography. This is also the reason why Emilio D’Itri, founder of the festival and Artistic Director for this edition, in agreement with the selection committee (made up by Annalisa D’Angelo, Tiziana Faraoni, Marco Pinna e Lina Pallotta), has never wanted to restrict the event to a specific “theme” and starting this year, he has also decided to break the confines of space by taking the exhibitions to the streets.
Concurrently with the innovation of “open-air photography”, exhibits within traditional venues will continue to be offered and the talks and screenings included in the programme will further capture the impromptu, informal nature of the festival. There will also be a bookshop area provided through the collaboration of over ten specialized publishing houses and bookshops including, Peliti Associati Editore, Postcart Edizioni, Skinnerboox, Witty Kiwi, and Yard Press.
The festival will also feature portfolio reviews dedicated to critiquing photographs and images. Our acclaimed portfolio reviews stand out for the quality of the review committee we select each year from well-known photo editors, critics, curators, journalists and professionals in the field who offer their expert know-how and experience to the festival. The reviewers for FotoLeggendo 2016 are: Diego Orlando, Daria Scolamacchia, Laura Serani, Lorenzo Castore, Emiliano Mancuso, Tiziana Faraoni, Marco Pinna, Annalisa D’Angelo, Lina Pallotta, Augusto Pieroni, Chiara Oggioni Tiepolo, Arianna Visani, Alex Bocchetto, Arianna Rinaldo, Mario Peliti, Sandro Iovine, Emanuela Mirabelli, Renata Ferri, Arianna Catania, Maria Teresa Salvati, Carla Rak, Milo Montelli, Guido Fuà, Chiara Capodici, Fiorenza Pinna, Niccolò Fano. There will also be special portfolio reviews curated by photographic agencies including, Echo Photo Agency, Parallelozero, Contrasto, LUZ photo agency, Ulixes Picture, that will examine the works that are ready for publishing and will offer valuable advice and feedback to professional photographers.
How FotoLeggendo 2016 Works | 10-11-12 June.
This year the inauguration of the festival (following an initial exhibit that opens on 9 June at the Matèria gallery) will unwind throughout three days, the 10th, 11th and 12th of June. The spaces, locations and areas providing walls and becoming sites for photographic exhibitions and street art will be: Officine Fotografiche, Circolo degli Illuminati, Loft, and Rashomon Club. We have also established important collaborations with the Istituto di Istruzione Superiore Statale Cine TV Roberto Rossellini and DAMS (Discipline delle Arti, della Musica e dello Spettacolo) – Università degli s t u d i R o m a T r e that will be important points of reference for the exhibitions and events.
In addition to the opening of exhibitions, the three-day long inauguration will feature talks, book presentations, screenings, awards ceremonies and special events such as Temps Zero, an improvised concert played to images, Slideluck, the famous American itinerant event that combines food and art, Ammappaitalia, an Italian mapping project currently dedicated to the Fotoleggendo Festival, and Foto da Rubare, artistic “blitzes” that donate art to streets. All in compliance with the directive of the festival, “on the road”, that will include the pedestrianisation of the streets hosting the heart of the project: Via Libetta and Via degli Argonauti, in the Ostiense neighbourhood.
From 15 June (until 2 July) the festival will spread to the rest of the city: the Roma Porta San Paolo train station, the adjacent Polo Museale ATAC (featuring L’esodo: il viaggio continua a series of exhibitions curated by Emilio D’Itri focusing on the theme of “migrants”, drawing on last year’s project), and a network of art galleries that include the Istituto Superiore di Fotografia e Comunicazione Integrata, Galleria Interzone, 001 Photography, WSP Photography, Microprisma, and Officinenove. An exhibit by Gianluca Abblasio, “I am Dario”, will be presented at the outdoor spaces at Decathlon Prenestina.
Exhibitions at FotoLeggendo 2016
The festival will host over 30 photographic works in addition to various collective shows by students.
The Officine Fotografiche will be the site for David Alan Harvey’s, Tell It Like It Is. A milestone in photography documenting the incredible story of a black family in the USA in the 1960s told by the then twenty-year-old unknown Harvey who would soon become a superstar in photography, member of the legendary Magnum Photos, and photographer for National Geographic.
The Loft space will display Odyssey, a dreamlike multimedia installation by the Japanese artist now living in France, Miki Nitadori, sponsored by the Japanese Cultural Centre, which narrates the story and cultural contaminations of Japanese migrants in Hawaii. The Rashomon spaces will feature the moving work, la notte immense by Alisa Resnik. The courtyard of the Officine Fotografiche, on via Giuseppe Libetta, will boast the outstanding exhibition of early 20th century photographs taken by the father of wildlife photography, George Shiras. In the age of digital photography, the Festival would not be complete without “mobile photography” exhibitions: #1415 Iran and Everyday Italy will be presented outdoors along the overpass at Via degli Argonauti.
In the area of publishing, the Italian leg of the prestigious International Photobook Dummy Award Kassel returns to Rome. It awards the best, unpublished photo book mock-ups (dummy). The books are shortlisted by an international jury of experts and exhibited at international photography events.
Live painting
The staff at Urban Lives, a blog that has followed and documented urban art in Italy through interviews, direct and indirect testimonies, photographs and videos since November 2014, will be curating the street art events taking part in the FotoLeggendo Festival.
In step with the theme of the 2016 edition, “Contamination”, Urban Lives has selected six Italian artists brought together by their shared interest in artistic research and continuous experimentation: NemO’s, Pepecoibermuda, ADR, RikyBoy, Psiko Patik and Espi. Live painting at FotoLeggendo 2016 will take place on the afternoon of Saturday, 11 June. It will be presented and documented live by the staff at Urban Lives with the professional services of the social media marketing agency, Brands Invasion. And Mimmo Rubino
There are many exhibitions, activities and events scheduled for the 12th edition of FotoLeggendo, that, let’s not forget, is an event with international ties including the sister festival, Boutographies – Rencontres photographiques de Montpellier, with which it has exchanged exhibitions and hospitality since 2006.
FotoLeggendo has always been dedicated to promoting the art of photography through numerous exhibitions by rising artists and professional photographers of international fame, and many events featuring debates and interaction between artists and the audience. After more than 10 years, the festival has become a much-awaited event and an important point of reference for the entire world of photography. In 2015 there were an estimated 10,000 participants, including photographers, visitors and professionals in the field, who visited the exhibitions and participated in events during the month of the festival, including 4,000 visitors to the ISA alone in three weeks.
