“I will love you down the streets of the world,” as Marco Pesaresi wrote in his diary. Having lived and explored at length, then he returned so he could make us live on the streets of his place in the world, the one that was more intimate and personal, more exuberant and tender, the one of his native land.
Thanks to the donation of the archive by his family to the Municipality of Savignano sul Rubicone and to our collaboration with the Marco Pesaresi Photo Library, we have managed to immerse ourselves in Marco’s world, opening a sort of Pandora’s box and discovering for the first time his Rimini project in its entirety, an accumulation of negatives, diaries, poems, and unpublished notes that enabled us to reflect on the changes that took place over the course of time and to restore an historic, contextualized vision of the Riviera in the 1990s. The Revisited version makes it possible for us to present Marco’s works in a new light, highlighting and broadening aspects of the area that were explored in the 2003 exhibition.
Opening the boxes that contained the negatives, studying their contact sheets and carefully analyzing every detail, we entered the stories that once unfolded in front of Marco’s lens. The sharp black and white contrasts, the foregrounds, the blurring, the endless shadow games may seem to be an aesthetic contrivance, but he is the one who does not think about them in these terms.
Instead, Marco captures the essence of the moments and atmospheres of certain places, stepping away from the constraints of storytelling and the obligation to explain. He charges the settings with sensitivity in an expressive manner, collects them in their emotional blurriness and lets himself be led by his intuition.
As Rimini is his most suggestive, autobiographical work, it is just as full of contrasts as is life itself. Taken as a whole, a complex comparable to an ethno-anthropological research work, a strong dichotomy can be perceived between the depicted worlds that is almost like bipolarity of photography. From one side, what we see are strong human interactions: we are visiting an energetic, throbbing Rimini which has become a symbol of summer, freedom and youthful euphoria, an ideal destination for someone looking for fun, music and entertainment, famous for its festivals that continue until dawn. But when the party comes to an end, or during winter, what we see is a deeper, often melancholy reflection on the relationship between people and places, one revealed in pictures where the iconic light-heartedness of the Romagna is missing. Between these two worlds, thematically so far apart yet geographically so close, lies the daily life of the province with its customs and its traditions.
As if in a car involved in a mad race that can’t be stopped, Marco manages to snare in a single instant the infinite melancholy that shows through the faces of the actors in this tireless, noisy, euphoric circle. He carries out an anti-conformist, existentialist exploration of marginal spaces, neglected themes and unlikely activities, assuming an attitude of openness, curiosity and availability towards the subject being photographed. What makes his approach special is the total abeyance of judgement, which allows him to capture nuances, emotions and details that would otherwise be difficult to grasp.
Marco Pesaresi goes beyond all prejudice, beyond making the body spectacular, beyond the usages and customs of the plain, geographic and generational borders, all to pay homage to his land and to meet us beyond the sea.
Jana Liskova
Curators: Mario Beltrambini & Jana Liskova
Dates: 24th June – 24th September 2023
Locations:
Ala Isotta, Fellini Museum, Castel Sismondo, Rimini
from Tuesday to Sunday 10.00-13.00 / 16.00-19.00
every Wednesday and Friday of July and August : 21.00 – 23.00
Sala Allende, Palazzo Martuzzi, corso Vendemini 18, Savignano sul Rubicone
Saturday and Sunday 10.00-13.00 / 16.00-19.00
