100 fotografie per ereditare il mondo

The exhibition “100 fotografie per ereditare il mondo” traces two centuries of photography through a selection of 100 images that reflect on how photography shapes the understanding of the present and preserves collective memory. The project examines photography as both a visual language and a historical archive, capable of recording transformations, conflicts and cultural shifts while contributing to the way societies remember and interpret events.

The exhibition opens with the introductory section “Società senza immagini – società con le immagini”, which presents early photographic formats such as daguerreotypes, ambrotypes and cartes de visite, illustrating the transition from a time when images were rare to an era in which photography becomes a social and personal instrument.

Subsequent sections explore key moments in the evolution of the medium. “Nascita della fotografia” focuses on early technical and artistic experiments, while “Fotografia: tra realtà e finzione” examines how modern photography moves beyond documentation towards formal experimentation and constructed imagery.

The exhibition continues with thematic sections addressing photography as document, diary and evocative image. These chapters examine how photography records historical events, explores identity and subjectivity, and constructs symbolic or staged realities.

The final section, “Fotografia come bussola per il domani”, focuses on contemporary practices that engage with issues shaping the twenty-first century, including migration, environmental change, social conflict and questions of identity. Through these perspectives, the exhibition presents photography as a medium that continues to interpret and redefine the relationship between image, memory and contemporary experience.

Artists: Nicéphore Niépce; Louis Daguerre; Julia Margaret Cameron; Hippolyte Bayard; Roger Fenton; Eadweard Muybridge; Man Ray; Aleksandr Rodčenko; André Kertész; Henri Cartier-Bresson; Philippe Halsman; Mario Giacomelli; Joan Fontcuberta; Dorothea Lange; Carol Guzy; Joel Meyerowitz; Martín Chambi; Claude Cahun; Pierre Molinier; Robert Mapplethorpe; Newsha Tavakolian; Sandy Skoglund; Nancy Burson; David LaChapelle; Mat Collishaw; Ebrahim Noroozi; Carlos Ayesta; Guillaume Bression; Gohar Dashti; Alba Zari; Carlos Idun-Tawiah

Curator: Denis Curti (in collaboration with Alessio Fusi and Alessandro Curti)