"TRACCE - Photography Travelling between Italy and Armenia" - an Article by Carlo Coppola
In pandemic times, it is not common to read about art projects that take travel and encounter as their starting point. While the sense of our globalised world seems to be collapsing inexorably and the dominant motto is “go home if you can” — sometimes crossing oceans and entire continents — for many people home is the country to which they emigrated and that, for better or worse, welcomed them. It is in these times of crisis that connections between countries, distant families and cultures become deep but barely visible traces, much like the hidden roots of every individual.
The Casertan artist Patrizia Posillipo, moving obstinately against the current, has undertaken a complex journey, chasing these traces between two countries linked for centuries by an ancestral relationship and dialogue: Italy and Armenia.
At a delicate moment in which Armenia is being severely hit by Covid-19 and Italy, despite its own internal difficulties, is among the first nations to send aid, the bond between the two countries feels more alive than ever. Patrizia Posillipo’s project resonates with particular hope.
“Tracce” is the latest project of the public art programme “Opere Vive”, launched in 2018 in collaboration with curator Isabella Indolfi, with the aim of creating a bridge between contemporary Italian and Armenian culture.
This was stated by Ambassador Vincenzo Del Monaco, head of the Italian Embassy in Armenia and promoter of the initiative.
“TRACCE – Italy Armenia” is a journey from west to east, from north to south, across the main Italian and Armenian regions, in search of the connections that are still alive between the two countries. Places and faces will tell this intense bond, made of cultural, artistic, scientific and commercial exchanges.
Patrizia Posillipo’s journey began in Italy, following precise historical and cultural coordinates thanks to the scientific contribution of Prof. Carlo Coppola, a scholar of Armenian culture, who provided a detailed map of places and people to track down. The artist set out on the hidden footsteps of ordinary people who carry with them bags of objects and personal stories: migrants who know no borders and leave traces of their passage or their permanence; identities formed in the intertwining of deep and heterogeneous cultural roots.
A photographer of extraordinary sensitivity, Patrizia Posillipo has already created projects such as “Nomadi” and “Africa del Nord”, in which she recounts cultures and places with a sharp eye, using photography to explore in depth the spirit of a place or the texture of a face. The true subjects of her images are the stories that each person tells through gazes, gestures, places and objects chosen to be portrayed. In this Italian-Armenian project, people become living traces of the culture they carry within, witnesses and creators of the encounter between two countries very similar in culture, religion and character.
“Patrizia Posillipo’s photographic eye is like a caress: it does not appropriate the image nor merely record it, but, thanks to the time granted by the posed portrait technique, enters into close relationship with the subjects, with the aim of capturing their character and feelings. This is the meaning of an almost anthropological approach that succeeds not only in documenting the transformations of communities and individuals, but also in capturing their inner landscapes, raising them to a poetic metaphor of the drama and beauty of identities in continuous evolution.”
These are the words of curator Isabella Indolfi.
The first photographs taken in Italy show faces with proud Armenian features, such as that of Rupen, portrayed in Bari among the carpets for which his country of origin is a major producer. Not only faces: objects and symbols also tell stories, as does the Armenian alphabet revealed in an ancient manuscript preserved in the library of the Armenian College in Rome.
The “TRACCE – Italy Armenia” project will be complete when the journey can continue towards Armenia, in search of the Italians who live there or who have contributed to the country’s cultural life. A public installation in the Armenian capital and a catalogue, produced by the Italian Embassy in Armenia, will return to the communities and the public the emotions and stories collected.
Over the years she has collaborated with internationally renowned Italian and foreign photographers, contributing to specialised magazines such as Cinema Sessanta directed by Prof. Mino Argentieri. For years owner of Studio Posillipo, she worked for the C.E.I. and the Ministry of Ecclesiastical Cultural Heritage as responsible for photographic shoots and image archiving. She created multimedia videos for Peugeot Italia and other companies. At the same time, she has pursued individual and collective artistic research paths, exhibited in various galleries and currently represented by IPERCUBO.
Carlo Coppola
