FRANCESCO RAFFAELLI
Immagini Umane
from 10 to 31 May 2025
The Exhibition
Through his photography, Francesco Raffaelli goes on exploring the boundaries between physical space and perception, offering a unique perspective on the mutability of places and their impact on collective memory. He has dedicated part of his photographic work to the representation of people with various types of disabilities, in these images Raffaelli manages to capture the intimacy and complexity of his subjects, highlighting moments of everyday life in shots of great intensity. This author is part of an Italian photographic tradition that includes masters such as Guido Guidi, Mario Giacomelli, or even foreign ones, such as Diane Arbus, Michael Schmidt, but with his own voice that emphasizes formal rigor and a meditative visual narration. His approach becomes a testimony of time and of the social and cultural transformations that shape the contemporary world.
With Immagini Umane, Francesco Raffaelli takes us to a place where he questions the boundary between the artefact and the real, between the memory of the body and its reproduction. They are fragments torn from their original context that take on a new life in the photographer’s lens. Stolen and decontextualized, they become symbols of a trapped beauty that resists time, the act of theft, transforming into new relics. The exhibition invites us to reflect on this process, intrinsically linked to pain, loss of identity, solitude.
The Artist
Francesco Raffaelli in 95’ is presented at the Italian Pavilion of the Venice Biennale. His works are found in public and private collections including: Cabinet des Estampes de la Biblioteque Nationale de Paris, Musèe de la Photographie Charleroi (Belgium), Alinari Museum of the History of Photography Florence, Study Center Archive of Communication of the University of Parma.
Among the publications: Passaggi Fotografici: Lewis Baltz, Guido Guidi, Francesco Raffaelli, Gilbert Fasteanekens Ed. Hey Girl! with Romeo Castellucci Ed. Societas Raffaello Sanzio, Animals extracted from Other Places Ed Silver book, Portraits of School Ed Pitagora, Fino in Fondo Ed. Quinlan Voi Siete Qui-Jovanotti Safari Tour Ed. Rizzoli, La Fabbrica Diffusa: Michele Buda, Francesca Gardini, Guido Guidi, Francesco Raffaelli, Massimo Sordi, Ed.Quodlibet . Some volumes are present in Italian and foreign libraries including: Victoria & Albert Museum London, Moma New York, Getty Museum Los Angeles. He has been invited to present his works at: the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Bologna, the Academy of Fine Arts of Ravenna, the Triennale of Milan and the Italian Cultural Institute in Cologne.
