Lou Dematteis. A Journey Back/Un viaggio di ritorno. Fotografie in Italia 1972- 1980

The Museum di Roma in Trastevere hosts the exhibition dedicated to the images documenting the award-winning American photojournalist's Italian journeys on the trail of his roots.  

1972, 1977, 1979 and 1980: these are the four years that Dematteis immortalised, in a sort of Grand Tour on film, crossing Italy by train from North to South, from his paternal grandparents' villages - between Piedmont and Liguria - Milan, Venice, Bologna, the Romagna coast, Florence and Tuscany, Rome, Naples and the Amalfi coast, Lucania, Calabria and Sicily. This experience, proving photography powerful, communicative and political meaning, led the artist to become a professional.

On display are more than 100 images, most of them unpublished and reproduced in the form of silver salts prints, which give a portrait of Italian society over a period of about ten years through the vision of a young man with radical ideas in search of answers in his origins, belonging to a cultural, social and political context so distant from the place where he grew up.

Accompanied by the verses of the Beat poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti, the exhibition testifies to the events of the time - civil battles, illegal labour and work in the fields, daily and social life, factories, schools, faces and places - and, at the same time, evokes the compelling idea of a lost Italy. It is enriched by a short documentary by Paolo Pisanelli and Matteo Gherardini, with which the author tells his story and travels in his second homeland. 

The exhibition, curated by Claudio Domini and Paolo Pisanelli, is promoted by Roma Capitale, Assessorato alla Cultura - Sovrintendenza Capitolina ai Beni Culturali, produced and realised by the cultural association Errata Corrige, in collaboration with Big Sur, Officina Visioni, Cinema del Reale, with the contribution of Fondazione Home Movies-Archivio Nazionale del Film di Famiglia, Archivio Franco Pinna. 

Photo: Roma, 1979_rgb