Fotografia Europea 2023: the exhibitions not to be missed

Fotografia Europea 2023 opens on April 28 (inaugural days until May 1st), the international festival whose focal centre is Reggio Emilia.

This 18th edition is devoted to the idea of Europe and deals with the complexity of current events, where the very roots of our individual and social identities are constantly being questioned. Photography as a medium offers an opportunity to observe a world in rapid change and help us to understand its dynamics, aiming of making sense of the restlessness that runs through it.

It would be interesting to devote more than one day experiencing Fotografia Europea through the events that enliven it until June 11. But if time is a constraint, all that remains is to plan and optimize your visit or instead let yourself be carried away by the captivating atmosphere of the event, which The Lucie Awards have named the best Photo Festival of the Year.

Europe matters: Visions of a Restless Identity is the key theme to which the projects selected by the Festival’s board of artistic directors – Tim Clark, Walter Guadagnini & Luce Lebart – refer to.

Besides the exhibitions, the Festival is enriched by a calendar of events, conferences, book signings, meetings with artists, portfolio readings, and more.

Paths to explore

We leave the pleasure of discovering the many proposals to our readers, while pointing out some of them.

The monumental Chiostri di San Pietro – the hub of the festival – hosts ten solo exhibitions dealing with changes in society and cultural identity, landscape and borders, colonial past and cultural hybridity thanks to the works by Mónica De Miranda, Jean-Marc Caimi & Valentina Piccinni, Simon Roberts, Alessia Rollo, Samuel Gratacap, Yelena Yemchuk, Geoffroy Mathieu, Cédrine Scheidig, and those by The Archive of Public Protests, which brings together the visual traces of social activism.

The historical exhibition for the current edition of the festival is Sabine Weiss, Una vita da fotografa, curated by Virginie Chardin. Weiss, one of the most important voices of French humanist photography, used to practice all fields of photography, immortalizing her subjects’ emotions and feelings.

Among the shows on stage at the Chiostri di San Domenico venue, there are the specially commissioned exhibition the festival entrusts to a different artist every year (Myriam Meloni this time) and the winning projects of the OPEN CALL.

Palazzo da Mosto features, besides other shows, works from the Ars Aevi collection celebrating Bosnia Herzegovina as the Guest Country of Fotografia Europea 2023.

Partner’s exhibitions

Organized by the city’s leading cultural institutions, many other Partner’s exhibitions gravitate around the festival.

At Palazzo dei Musei, the photography section proposes Un piede nell’Eden. Luigi Ghirri and others’ gaze. Giardini in Europa and L’Architettura degli Alberi as well as the project Giovane Fotografia Italiana #10 | Premio Luigi Ghirri 2023, curated by Ilaria Campioli and Daniele De Luigi.

The Panizzi Photo Library presents various shows, including Flashback with works from those exhibited during Fotografia Europea 2007, which also focused on the theme of Europe.
You Tourned the Tables On Me, at Spazio Gerra, presents 115 portraits of the most famous contemporary musicians by Roberto Masotti.

No Home from War: Tales of Survival and Loss, the first exhibition in Italy by the Irish photojournalist Ivor Prickett, is on at Collezione Maramotti.

The CSAC – Communication Studies and Archive Centre – of the University of Parma proposes Antonio Sansone: Rituali d’Europa, with images that are an interesting example of civil commitment photojournalism in the aftermath of the Second World War.

Photography is pervasive in Reggio Emilia

The complete programme is available on the festival’s website. It includes, for instance, the training project Speciale Diciottoventicinque, conferences, book presentations and [PARENTESI] BOOKFAIR, the space dedicated to independent publishers.
Fotografia Europea also re-proposes its musical declination FOTOFONIA, curated by Max Casacci, founder of Subsonica.

The CIRCUITO OFF , the independent event that enriches the festival with countless exhibitions, presents projects by professionals alongside young photographers, enthusiasts and associations.

Part of this circuit is also the OFF@school project involving schools in the province of Reggio Emilia. The evening of May 6 is dedicated to the CIRCUITO OFF. On this occasion, the winner of the Max Spreafico Prize will be announced.