Ragusa Foto Festival 2024

Under the theme of Prendersi Una Pausa (Taking A Break), the 12th edition of Ragusa Foto Festival will be held next summer, led by founder Stefania Paxhia and artistic director Massimo Siragusa.

Overview

Since 2012, the Festival has been an opportunity for discussion and exchange dealing extensively with the different languages of visual arts. Indeed, it is renowned for its support to young authors and for its attention to the Sicilian territory, and the issues affecting the Mediterranean area. Every year, the festival has recourse to the valuable support of a scientific committee composed of scholars and experts on different disciplines to enhance the contribution of a plurality of voices, give life to a virtuous network, and inspire large audiences. Exhibitions and training events revolve around a theme identified every year, and it involves artists, authors, critics and cultural operators of the highest level. The dialogue between different cultures in the Sea Between Lands represents the oldest of the peculiarities of the Mediterranean.

To evoke it, Antiruggine - An association with the purpose of territorial and cultural promotion of the Mediterranean area of Sicily by planning initiatives and events of international scope - organizes Ragusa Foto Festival, a cultural platform intertwining tradition and modernity through the different languages of visual culture.

“Every pause is heaven in which I lose myself,” wrote Modican poet Salvatore Quasimodo, Nobel laureate in literature. Ragusa Foto Festival 2024, starts precisely from these verses to offer, thanks to the diversity of the gazes of the authors on display, opportunities for reflection and new horizons in which one can lose oneself.

The charming village of Ragusa Ibla, a Baroque jewel and Unesco heritage site, is the ideal setting to host the 12th edition of Ragusa Foto festival entitled Taking A Break. We live in a time when the temporary has the upper hand over the permanent and we are unable to look clearly to the future. The continuous tension generated by the speed that characterizes modernity has now become a significant aspect of life and is bringing about a profound transformation in the relationship between both human beings and humans and the environment.

To be able to take a pause for reflection, to seek attunement with nature, to allow oneself the luxury of building deep relationships. Breaking down one's defenses and getting involved in the emotions that life offers us. There are various paths we can take to reverse a course, to offer ourselves a new opportunity and to orient ourselves in these complex years. Photography, a very effective tool to help us in the process of understanding reality, is also the best language to show us ways and methods, to open new horizons of thought, to invoke the need for change and to suggest other perspectives of life.

Among the exhibited artists are Antonio Biasucci and Mimmo Palladino, Simona Guizzoni, Marco Zanta, Loredana Nemes, Ferdinando Scianna, Luca Capigotto, Viola Pantano, Umberto Coa, Angelo Raffaele Turetta, Alessandro Cristofoletti, Claire Power and Ciro Battiloro.

The festival program includes exhibitions, a workshop with Angelo Raffaele Turetta, and portfolio reviews with experts such as Benedetta Donato, Tiziana Faraoni, Irene Alison, Luca Santese and Paola Sammartano.