Matera is an enchanting city, rich in art and history: the ideal setting for films and a cultural centre. And Effimero permanente offers an engaging introduction to the city’s many facets, providing a unique perspective through over a hundred photographs, most of which are previously unpublished. The book is the result of thirty years of research by Antonello Di Gennaro, a photographer specialising in art photography.
Indeed, Matera should be explored from the Sassi, a complex of houses, rupestrian churches and monasteries built in natural caves, that constitute “a unique cultural landscape” and earned the city its UNESCO World Heritage Site status, to the contemporary art scene that thrives here.
Effimero permanente also recounts the story of the Grandi Mostre nei Sassi. Curated by Giuseppe Appella and the Circolo La Scaletta, these events have been hosted in the churches of Madonna delle Virtù and San Nicola dei Greci, as well as in the rooms of the MUSMA (Matera’s Museum of Contemporary Sculpture), and have marked the cultural scene of Matera since 1978. Antonello Di Gennaro has documented the work of more than thirty artists and the numerous exhibitions that have taken place in the city’s most significant locations, including palaces, rupestrian churches, and museums amid the Sassi.
As curator Roberto Lacarbonara explains, “the artwork and the space are defined as inseparable and “reciprocal”. Viewed in this light, the figurative sculpture of Manzù or Finotti, as well as the informal sculpture of Hare or Milani, the totemic forms of Sebaste and De Luca, and the ascending motions of Paradiso, constitute an organic visual universe, inextricably intertwined, true places of the spirit. It is therefore a matter of moving from the observation and photographic representation of the artwork to a sort of partaking in it: not the mere recording or pure “reproduction” of an existing reality, but rather the attempt to create something different, to give it a new form”.
Di Gennaro is part of the contemporary authorial photography scene and offers a visual language that combines artistic research and experimentation. “Documenting a work of art through photography involves more than just recording its form to preserve its memory; it also involves an interpretive process aimed at capturing its visual and conceptual essence. In this sense, documentary photography acts as a mediator between the artwork’s identity and the narratives it can generate. I highlight the relationship between the artwork and its exhibition context through the conscious use of light. The creation of different atmospheres provides further interpretative clues. The result is a documentation that contributes to broaden the artwork’s meaning and prolongs its vitality over time and in the eyes of the observer,” Antonello Di Gennaro says.
The volume, the author’s eightieth, edited by Roberto Lacarbonara and with an editorial project by Carla Cantore, is part of the MIP-Matera International Photography series. It features texts by Roberto Lacarbonara, Angelo Bianco Chiaromonte and Michele De Ruggieri.
Paola Sammartano
Antonello Di Gennaro : Effimero Permanente
Sfera Edizioni
Curator: Roberto Lacarbonara
Texts by Roberto Lacarbonara, Angelo Bianco Chiaromonte and Michele De Ruggieri
Book in Italian and English
Format: 23,5X28 cm
Cover: Rigid Bodonian with black silk and printed slide
240 pages
93 color and 25 black and white photos
ISBN: 9791282019262
Price: € 264,00
https://www.materainternationalphotography.com/
http://www.sfera-web.com/
www.antonellodigennaro.com
