Photolux Festival 2024

Photolux Festival is the International Biennial of Photography that is set in Lucca, Italy.

Overview

What does it mean to be Italian today? What are our identity roots and which Italy do we want to build for the future? Photography can help us outline the contemporary image of the Bel Paese, analyzing its evolution, changes and contradictions. The theme of this edition is dedicated to Italy. But why call it “The Beautiful Country?” It is the name given par excellence to Italy in memory of the famous verses of Dante «Del bel paese là dove ‘l sì sona» ( Inf. XXXIII, 80). In building this edition of the Festival, they were inspired by Dante’s verses, which express a typically Italian feeling: the awareness of living in a wonderful country, but at the same time full of contradictions. The exhibition program of the Festival reflects this duality: on the one hand the beauties of our country, on the other its fragilities and contradictions. The narrative is built through the dialogue between the works of important names in Italian and international photography and those of emerging authors.

Light, the essence of photography, is the symbol of this project. At a time in history when we are constantly assaulted and pervaded by images, Photolux, like an ancient camera obscura, aims to project a clear and defined selection of the international photographic panorama. In the name of energy and discovery, Photolux Festival wants to be a precious meeting point, a crossroads of great masters, experts in the field and enthusiasts, also opening a glimmer from which to observe new talents and the most avant-garde languages. The Festival collects and carries on the legacy of the Lucca Photo Fest, the photography and video art festival born in 2005. In 2012, driven by the desire to focus even more on quality, the event became biennial with the new name Photolux Festival.

The spirit and goals, however, have remained the same: under the banner of energy and discovery, Photolux aims to be a valuable moment of encounter, a crossroads of great masters, experts in the field, and enthusiasts, while also opening a chink from which to observe new talent and cutting-edge languages. The festival has become one of the most interesting on the European scene thanks both to the quality of the exhibitions on display and the authors proposed and to the organizational efficiency of our staff. The always numerous presence of experts and journalists, including international ones, and the consensus of critics, public and press confirm that Lucca can be considered as a point of reference for photography in Italy and Europe.