Troppo freddo per te qui
From 25 November 2017 to 26 January 2018
at CAMPO.
Curated by Emilia Giorgi.
In 2013 – a year after the Libyan revolution of 2012 which lead to the destitution and death of Gheddafi – Delfino Sisto Legnani (Milan, 1985), undertakes a photographic campaign in Libya, together with the photographer Giovanna Silva, to document the state of architecture after the regime’s collapse. The journey follows the path of the revolution: starting from Benghazi in the Cyrenaica region and, passing through Misurata – scene of the most ferocious episodes of the conflict – arrives to Tripoli, capital of Libya and seat of all the administrative buildings. A small part of this extensive reportage is published on the magazine Domus in 2013.
Four years later CAMPO presents the work of the Milanese artist and photographer in a personal exhibition curated by Emilia Giorgi.
The title of the exhibition, Troppo freddo per te qui (Too cold for you here) comes from the motto used by the Tuwwar rebels against Gheddafi, which metaphorically refers to the specific meteorological conditions of the Cyrenaica region.
Delfino Sisto Legnani proposes a site specific installation, cutting up the space of the gallery with large format images impressed on fabric. The installation itself becomes an essential part of the exhibition, where the visitor accompanies the photographer in a journey through a sequence of large landscapes in which abandoned spaces and architectures take the form of surreal everyday apparitions.
In this Libyan journey we encounter sacked and destroyed governmental buildings becoming temporary housing for the population as well as ready but never used skyscrapers for American hotel chains. We run into the Italian colonial architecture of the 1920s and 1930s and in entirely new unfinished cities – outcome of an agreement between Gheddafi and the Chinese government – which occupy the landscape of Cyrenaica like ghosts, with their skeletons made of tons of concrete without end. The last stop of this trip is Gheddafi’s house, which offers some of the most suggestive shoots: a city within the city surrounded by the houses of all the colonel’s collaborators and by the sumptuous spaces where Presidents and Premiers from all over the world where received.
Thanks to his architectural formation and his experience with important architectural magazines, Delfino Sisto Legnani offers an unusual perspective on the war reportage, focusing on the effects on the architecture as the index of the consequences of war. The images are also accompanied by a series of objects found and collected along the journey, like a copy of the Green Book published by Gheddafi in 1975 and translated in 53 languages. The exhibition is part of the program Passeggiate Fotografiche Romane, promoted by the photography department of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism directed by Lorenza Bravetta. The program organizes in Rome three days and five paths, real or metaphorical, to discover places and characters of the photography world through a series of exhibitions, debates, guided tours, opening of archives, workshops, performances and projections.
