In those 'Familiar Places' time stopped for a moment, or rather, Anna Di Prospero stopped it at the height of its emotional intensity.
The artist, born in Rome in 1987, explores reality through the photographic medium, with a language in which painting, performance, sculpture and perhaps even music converge in perfect symbiosis. At CUBO , she presents two of her most recent photographic series: one dedicated to urban architecture, the other to family affections and ties. These subjects are also central to the mission strongly desired by Unipol for the exhibition space, which has linked its exhibitions specifically to architectural experimentation and reflection on the values on which our everyday life is based.
“The architectures are carefully chosen, then observed for a long time, during extended residences abroad and repeated trips. Anna began by photographing inside and outside the walls of her home with the series I Am Here, and then moved far away, travelling around the world, discovering the geometries of the city [...]. Some elements recur, like counterpoints to a melody: bare legs, hands touching, monochromatic black or red dresses, long loose hair or gathered in a ballerina's bun. Shots where the body curves or bends appear to be flooded with music. Emotions emerge in those clean, precise, carefully constructed movements, which may hint at Pina Bausch's choreography.
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- Marseille #8, 2014
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- Marseille #9, 2014
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- Untitled, 2012 (Jubilee Church - Roma, Italy)
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- Untitled, 2015 (The Vanke Pavilion - Expo Milan 2015, Italy)
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- Untitled, 2015 (Vodafone Building - Porto, Portugal)
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- Untitled, 2015 (Auditorium Oscar Niemeyer - Ravello, Italy)
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- Untitled, 2011 (The Guggenheim Museum – Bilbao, Spain)
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- Untitled, 2015 (Den Blå Planet - Copenhagen, Denmark)
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- Untitled, 2010 (Social Housing in Carabanchel - Madrid, Spain)
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- Untitled, 2010 (El Mirador de Sanchinarro, social housing - Madrid, Spain)
Here is the second heart of the exhibition, images of her family members, designed together with them in every detail, from the choice of clothing to the place and pose. They are part of With You, a more extensive research into relationships, family ties, friends and even strangers. Here the figure is present and presents itself, losing all anonymity. Light plays a fundamental role in these images to direct the gaze, but it is discreet and tender, like the family love that portrayed. The handshakes, the hugs, the closeness, and the clinging to each other all seem to suggest that words cannot say what the eye can perceive. The artist teaches us to look at and understand emotions in their most intense manifestations. It's as if she, too, clings to photography, architecture and light to breathe because, despite the construction of the shots, what emerges has a flavour of unusual naturalness and spontaneity.
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- Self-portrait with my father, 2011
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- Self-portrait with my brother, 2011
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- Self-portrait with my mother, 2011
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- Self-portrait with my grandmother Alfreda, 2011
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- Self-portrait with my sister, 2011
The scenes are reconstructions of reality, with a technique comparable to that of major photographers such as Gregory Crewdson, capable of enhancing reality and making it more evocative, even absurdly abstract, like when two arms become white lines that slice uniform backgrounds of colour. It always starts with the artist, her self, her body, the search for her affections, and her life experiences.
'These self-portraits are small performative acts, as discreet as the poses that the artist assumes on the entrance steps of a building, on the asphalt of a street, against a concrete wall… The architecture becomes her home for an instant and the palette upon which to paint unspoken sensations'. (from the text in the catalogue by A ntonio Grulli)
