Trieste Photo Days 2018: let’s go!

International urban photo festival Trieste Photo Days 2018 will take place in a circuit of venues in Trieste, seaside city in North-Eastern Italy, from October 18 to November 25, with an eventful opening weekend: October 26, 27 and 28.

The festival’s fifth edition will gather dozens of exhibitions by Italian and foreign artists showcasing more than 700 photographs, along with screenings, contests, portfolio readings, book presentations, meetings. The core of the festival is Urban photography, which contains multiple points of view on photography, as well as types: from architectural to street photographs, from the analysis of the region to social commitment.

The festival is promoted by Italian Cultural Association dotART, together with the Museum Service of the Municipality of Trieste, with the contribution of the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region and the Casali Foundation, InstallPro and Unicusano’s main partnerships and the artistic direction of Angelo Cucchetto.

Simultaneous translation services for non-Italian speakers will be offered.

Guests and exhibitions

Two great Japanese photographers are the main guests of this edition: Tatsuo Suzuki and Tadashi Onishi, members of the VoidTokyo street photographers group, whose photos will be displayed in what will be one of the most important exhibitions of the festival at the City Museum of Oriental Art.
The VoidTokyo exhibition, conceived and created by the Civic Museums of History and Art of the Municipality of Trieste, describes the Japanese capital in dark black and white, winking at the Japanese school of Eikoh Hosoe. In addition to the works of Suzuki and Onishi, a selection of photos of the other members will be exhibited: Hiroki Fujitani, Naoki Iwao, Yukari Unleash Sasaki, Keiichi Ichikawa, Tadashi Yamashita, Ash Shinya Kawaoto, Kawara Chan, Miho Okawa, So Sasaki.
The VoidTokyo exhibition will open on Friday, October 26 at 4 pm in the presence of Tatsuo Suzuki and Tadashi Onishi, immediately after the presentation of the fourth VoidTokyo magazine that will be held at Eataly’s “La Scuola” at 2 pm. The two Japanese guests will also hold an exclusive four-handed photographic workshop as part of the festival.

Sicilian photographer Francesco Faraci will also be among the protagonists, bringing to the City Museum Sartorio his Atlante Umano Siciliano (Sicilian Human Atlas), a provocative look at the countless contrasts of the island: life and death, chaos and silence, joy and sadness, resignation and redemption. The author will join the opening on Thursday 25 October at 5 pm and will hold a seminar on Sunday October 28 at the “Bobi Bazlen” Hall of Palazzo Gopcevich, the festival’s main venue during the opening weekend.

Martin Vegas will also be among the guests of the festival with his Street Sans Frontières project, a group exhibit of artists coming from five continents that will be set up in the DoubleRoom exhibition space (inaugurating on Tuesday October 23 at 6 pm). The exhibition, which has already touched Arles, London, Paris and Cologne, will contain the best of contemporary street photography.

Another important exhibition will be Silenzi Urbani (Urban Silences) at the “U. Veruda” hall: a tribute to Italian photographer Gabriele Basilico curated by Gigliola Foschi, displaying projects by Loredana Celano, Assunta D’Urzo, Luca Rotondo, Luca Setti and Marko Vogric, the five photographers selected by the call on Photographers.it. The projects will be displayed along with a selection of positives by Gabriele Basilico, taken from the Trouver Trieste (Paris, 1985-1986) exhibit and kept at the Photo Library of the Civic Museums of History and Art of the Municipality of Trieste. An original contamination between past and present, between the master and the continuers of his work. The exhibition, which will ideally close the festival, will open on Friday November 9 at 5pm.

Other exhibitions include Yo soy Fidel and Il sottile riflesso by Francesco Comello and Lorenzo Zoppolato at Circolo Fincantieri Wärtsilä’s “Sala Fenice”, opening on October 24, and Flowing City group exhibit at Trieste Airport on October 18. And naturally, URBAN 2018 Photo Awards winners exhibit at Photoscaglia Studio (formerly Lux Art Gallery).

This year, Venetian performer Ivana Galli will join the festival: the artist will create a set room, where she’ll create her magnificent Broken up Portraits, providing photographed subjects with immediate prints. Ivana’s work investigates the emotions and the soul of her subjects and has gathered enthusiastic support in many photography events last summer.

The meetings and presentations

Several presentations are also scheduled throughout the central weekend: they will consist of talks between art director Angelo Cucchetto and the authors: Anna Chiara Moggia with her poetic tribute book Iran through a lens, Adriano Cascio with his last fanzine Imperfect Shadow, Diego Bardone with his new book Street Life Milano, Greek photographer/architect Pygmalion Karatzas with his architecture photography project The Integral Lens, Dutch Giedo van der Zwan presenting Pier to Pier, Mariagrazia Beruffi presenting the preview of her new project Terra rossa, Andrea Rossato with his Geometries.
Also, the presentation of the third volume of Cities magazine by Angelo Cucchetto, and the presentation of Flowing City and URBAN unveils the City and its secrets (Vol. 4) photographic volumes.

Outside the opening weekend, on November 9, a meeting between Michele Smargiassi, journalist of La Repubblica, and Andrè Gunthert, author of L’immagine condivisa (The shared Image) will be held.

Contests, portfolio readings and awards

On Saturday October 27, the program at the “Bazlen” Hall of Palazzo Gopcevich will reach its peak with two award ceremonies.

Starting at 7.30 pm, the TPD Book Award 2018 award ceremony, the festival’s free call for dummies to select an authorial photographic project to be produced as a book. This year, the call has gathered 82 participating photographers from all over the world, among whom the jury has chosen two ex aequo winners: Greek Zisis Kardianos with his InLimbo project, and Japanese Hiro Tanaka with Around 42nd and 7th.
Both authors will join the ceremony to collect their prize and present their books, published by dotART, which will cover both promotion and distribution.

The URBAN 2018 Photo Awards ceremony will take place at 8 pm. The final podium will be unveiled before President of the Jury Tatsuo Suzuki, and the medals will be awarded to the Overall Winner, the ranked photographers for each category and to the Honourable Mentions.

TPD Portfolio is a novelty for the festival, a free photographic selection, open to the public and based on Portfolio readings. On October 27 and 28, Fulvio Merlak, institutional soul of Italian photography and the driving force behind Portfolio Italia, will guide the portfolio readers team at the Library of the Eastern Greek Community. One portfolio will be selected and announced on Sunday afternoon. It will become a personal exhibition within the next TPD 2019.
The readers will be: Orietta Bay, Tullio Fragiacomo, Monica Mazzolini and Fulvio Merlak.

Workshops

In addition to the workshop held by Tatsuo Suzuki and Tadashi Onishi, there will also be the Isp Experience: on the weekend of October 20 and 21, Italian photographer Graziano Perotti will coordinate a shooting in the city for a special edition of Cities magazine dedicated to the Festival. This comes after the first edition, published last spring for the Street Photo Milan Festival.
Graziano Perotti, a regular among the guests of the festival, is a photojournalist counting more than 200 works for the most important Italian magazines.

Trieste Photo Fringe 2018

Trieste Photo Fringe exhibits will crown the main program. It is Trieste Photo Days’ “off festival” which takes place in a selected circuit of venues in the city centre and contains group and personal exhibits by authors from all over the world.

Projects by Benedikt Schnabel, Carlo Travaglini Allocatelli, Christoph Montebelli, Daniel Munteanu, Federico Campanale, Giada Sponzilli, Gianluca Aggi, Gianluca Calice, Gianluca De Simone, Giedo Van Der Zwan, Giuliana Mariniello, Giulio Salusinszky, Lorenzo Leone, Massimiliano Camellini, Michele Ginevra, Miriam Nicastro, Monica Montefusco, Nik Erik Neubauer, Pygmalion Karatzas, Rebeka Legovic, Roberto Polillo and Samuel Dossi.

Group exhibit photos by: Alessandra Caroselli, Alice Falco, Andrea Scirè, Andrea Venuti, Arianna Faiella, Bohdan Lesiv, Carla Cosenza Mormile, Cate Franklyn, Claudia Barbaro, Claudio Giuli, Clive Eariss, Daniel Michelli, Daniele Pezzoli, Denis Marinello, Eddie Wexler, Emma Graziani, Eric Davidove, Fabrizio Picca, Farnaz Damnabi, Fiorenzo Rosa, Francesco Fredella, Francesco Garlaschelli, Francesco Monaco, Frédéric Ducos, Fréderic Mahy, Giacomo Festa, Giancarlo Staubmann, Gianluca Aggi, Giulia Coppetti, Giuseppe Cocchieri, Giuseppina Marconi, Jakob Sancin, Jean-Yves Coquelin, Josip Miskovic, Justin Labelle, Kelly Costantini, Leonardo Vitti, Lisa-Marie Kaspar, Lorenzo Giaccone, Maicol Baiana, Marcin Piekalkiewicz, Marco Lambardi, Marina Koryakin, Mark Cattaneo, Massimo Tabasso, Mattia Pasini, Maureen Miller, Maurizio Zanetti, Michele Forni, Michele Ginevra, Mike Lee, Mònika Kurucz, Narcisse E. Esfahani, Nathanael Fournier, Ohad Zwigenberg, Oliver Raschka, Paolo Manca, Ralph Rahmer, Raluca Ionela Butnaru, Riccardo Crevatin, Roberta Grubelli, Robin Vandenabeele, Samuel Dossi, Sebastiano Ciancio, Sebastien Durand, Shelley Corcoran, Silvia Manginelli, Simona Minutolo, Steffen Ebert, Vincenzo Errico, Yanika Anukulpun, Zoltán Vadászi and Zsolt Batori.