Paolo Roversi to Debut Exhibit During Milan Photo Vogue Festival
MILAN — The Italian, but Paris-based, fashion photographer Paolo Roversi is gearing up to debut an exhibition at Milan’s Palazzo Reale on Nov. 16.
The inauguration of the “Storie” [“Stories” in English] exhibit is organized in conjunction with the opening of the second edition of the Photo Vogue Festival 2017, running in Milan until Nov. 19.
“Due to the particular venue, which doesn’t feature a unique exhibition space, we decided to organize the exhibit in nine groups of pictures located in nine different rooms,” said Roversi reached by phone in Paris. “They are like nine different stories, nine themes that we picked with Alessia Glaviano [Vogue Italian senior photo editor,] who curated the exhibition, not following any specific logics but mostly guided by a certain freedom and by an emotional attitude.”
“Storie,” which will be open to the public until Dec. 17, retraces the professional path of Roversi, who stood out from the crowd with the use of the 8×10 Polaroid films and his incredible attention to light effects delivering intense images combining realism and illusion at the same time.
The exhibition will include pictures of his most private, personal experimentations, such as portraits and nudes, as well as more glamorous works focused on fashion subjects. An entire room will be dedicated to unpublished pictures of Rihanna.
“Not being a kid anymore, my career has been quite long and there are many periods which have been particularly relevant for me but probably what mostly marked my life is the relationship with the gorgeous girls I worked with,” said Roversi, who teamed with publishing company Skira to collect the pictures of the exhibition in a namesake book.“ They have been the muses who really inspired my work and stimulated my creativity.”
During his career, Roversi lensed a wide range of international women, from Bjork, Annie Lennox and Tilda Swinton to Natalia Vodianova, Kate Moss, Freja Beha Erichsen and Daria Werbowy, just to cite a few.
“I’m currently working on another exhibition in Milan completely dedicated to Naomi Campbell which will open at 10 Corso Como’s Sozzani Foundation in February,” said Roversi.
Introduced last year to connect upcoming talents with established figures of the photo industry, as well as involving the city of Milan with a series of initiatives celebrating photography, art and fashion, the Photo Vogue Festival 2017 features a rich program of events.
They include an exhibition, organized at the Base venue on Via Bergognone, called “Fashion and Politics in Vogue Italia.” This collects several images shot for the Italian magazine by international photographers, such as Steven Meisel, David Lachapelle, Bruce Weber, Tim Walker, Peter Lindbergh, Miles Aldridge, Mert & Marcus, Ethan James Green and Ellen Von Unwerth, who put the accent on social and cultural themes marking our times, from the overindulgence of plastic surgery to the glamorization of rehabs.
At the same location, Vogue will also host the “PhotoVogue/Visions” exhibit, which will showcase the images of 18 emerging photographers who submitted their pictures to vogue.it’s Photo Vogue digital platform and were selected by a prestigious jury, including The New Yorker’s photo critic Vince Aletti, Vogue Italia editor in chief Emanuele Farneti, Vogue Italia brand creative director Giovanni Bianco, Bruce Weber and New York Times senior staff photographer James Estrin, among others.
In addition, Base will also house photography-related talks for the entire duration of the festival and, on Nov. 18, a group of emerging photographers, selected by Vogue Italia, will have the chance to show their portfolios to experts of the sector.
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