journey into the abyss between dream and reality
Exhibition of photographs taken in the depths of the sea by Adriano Penco and paintings by Aglaja, who has graphically redesigned Adriano's photos, transforming them into stages on which dreamlike stories of characters live
Imaginary backdrops – THE LOCATION
The Galata Museo del Mare, the Commenda di Prè, and the Pegli Naval Museum are three museums united in a single strategic structure of the Municipality of Genoa, the Mu.MA Institution of Museums of the Sea and Migration, a cultural hub dedicated to the themes of the sea, travel, and dialogue between peoples, flavors, and religions. Characterized by virtuous management between public, private, and private-social sectors, under the presidency of Maria Paola Profumo and the direction of Pierangelo Campodonico, over the years the Mu.MA has developed guidelines that identify its unity and purpose, becoming the cultural soul of a sea system to be enhanced also through collaboration with similar institutional, economic, tourist and cultural entities. The flagship of Mu.MA is the Galata Museum of the Sea, inaugurated in 2004, the largest Maritime Museum in the Mediterranean, which, with its continuous renewal of exhibits and themes, has become a cultural reference worldwide. Located in the area between the Aquarium and the Maritime Station, the museum is housed in the oldest building of the old Darsena, once the Arsenal of the Republic of Genoa. Here, starting in 1500, the galleys of the Genoese fleet were built and armed. Thanks to an exhibition spread across four floors and an Open Air Museum whose main attraction is the Submarine S518 Nazario Sauro, the first floating museum The Galata is currently the largest maritime museum in the Mediterranean. Over the years, it has become a well-established and respected institution on the national and international cultural scene. It has been awarded two stars by the Touring Club Italiano (the highest recognition of its value), is included in the prestigious guide "The New York Times 36 Hours 125 Weekends in Europe," and has received Trip Advisor's Certificate of Excellence for several years. The museum's Director and scientific staff have established important global collaborations.
Imaginary backdrops – THE EVENT
IMAGINARY SEABED: A journey into the depths between dream and reality
Galata Maritime Museum – Exhibition Gallery
Calata dei Mari 1 – Genoa
Inauguration September 8, 2017 at 6:00 pm
Open from 8 September to 15 October 2017, museum hours
Imaginary backdrops – PRESENTATION
Imaginary backdrops It is a project born from the needs of the photojournalist Adriano Penco to put underwater photography at the service of terrestrial pictorial art. An ambitious project where underwater photographic images lend themselves to artistic interpretation and creativity. An example of how photography returns to the service of art and painting, as it did in the eighteenth century with the advent of Camera Obscura. Technique, chromatism, semiotics, creativity, emotions, all qualities already present in the frame of the author's frames, are taken up and reinterpreted by the creativity and graphic brushes of Aglaya, stage name of Gabriella Corbo, an established Ligurian cartoonist, illustrator, and digital painter.
Imaginary Backdrops This is the new challenge the authors have launched, demonstrating that the marine environment can be a harbinger of sophisticated shots, exporting images taken in all the world's seas outside of their submerged context, or, better yet, importing into that context what is (or should be) foreign. The surreal, dreamlike journey, spanning 29 paintings, unfolds in imaginative visions and unlikely encounters between different subjects who, in reality, have adapted to living at sea and on land, but who, in Aglaja's paintings, merge, enhancing and capturing the spirit and light of nature captured by Adriano, extrapolating those superstructures that the artist felt were alien to his imaginary world. The photographed subjects are thus reinvented and imbued with new meanings, which are visualized through colors, shifts in perspective, and different contours. All this gives the work a new, different, innovative meaning: the intent is precisely to arouse emotions in the observer, inviting them to indulge in play and imagination.
Adriano Penco This is how he describes this artistic adventure: “I feel flattered and doubly satisfied. Flattered because, together with a great artist, we have created an ambitious project, which is the pictorial representation, divided into twenty-nine paintings, of the marine environment interpreted in a dreamlike way by Aglaya. Satisfied because with my photographs I have inspired the illustrator's imagination to explore the depths, conveying to her the same emotions I experienced. Satisfied because, as I have long maintained, underwater photography can open up a broad horizon of application and experimentation, even beyond the confines of the diving community, and this, with a touch of innovation, is proof of that. For me, photography is a way to capture the moment and tell the world and its beauty. It brings subjects closer to me, to which I simply add a touch of art, creativity, and interpretation. Through photography, we can capture the movement that is life, and an artist's job is to restore that life. even if the image will be observed a century later”.
And here's how Aglaya tells the genesis of the project “On the occasion of the inauguration of my exhibition “How Deep the Sea Is” (in which, for the first time, I used the seabed and marine creatures as the backdrop for improbable imagined stories), I met Adriano Penco, an excellent nature photojournalist. It was on that occasion that Adriano He began to tell me about a project he had in mind: to give a "second life" to the extraordinary images his lens had captured in the depths of the sea. A life where reality would be combined with fantasy, where surreal characters and situations would suggest a second look, an alternative interpretation to the objective one. The paintings he had seen at my exhibition confirmed to him that the fantasy he needed was mine. So, over the past few months, Adriano has made his wonderful archive available to me: a treasure trove from which I have extracted 29 gems that I have reinvented into as many dreamlike paintings. Little by little, I have published on social media what I was creating, alongside Adriano's original photographs that stood behind each image. The success has been nothing short of flattering. A recognition that has brought us here, to the Museum of the Sea,the best place to realize our artistic project in an exhibition”.
Imaginary backdrops – THE AUTHORS
Aglaja (Gabriella Corbo) was born in Savona in the last century, has lived in Genoa for many years, and hasn't yet decided where she'll end her days. She visits a white barracks almost daily, where pimply teenagers greet her as "Prof."
He has spent and continues to spend his life reading, writing, and drawing with undiminished enthusiasm, fearlessly moving from books to ebooks, from pen to keyboard, from paper or canvas to graphics tablet.
He illustrated and drew cartoons on Enzo Costa's blog and website, on his author blogs on Repubblica.it (where he translated the “Lanterns” by Enzo and had his own cartoon column, “Domenicaglaja”) and Unità.it (“Bad moods”).
She is the author of the cover of the collection of satirical poems “Bacate Rhymes”, illustrated the writings of the volume “With hindsight”, and created cartoons and covers for “Searched with a Lantern”, All books signed by his partner in villainy. He also participated with Enzo Costa at the 2012 Genoa International Poetry Festival, showing his cartoons illustrating the author's rhymes. Several of his "serious" images have been featured in thematic exhibitions.
In 2010 he won first prize at the national competition Do you know how they treat me? announced by FISH (Italian Federation for the Overcoming of Handicap), for the cartoon category, a prize awarded by the Honorary Committee, composed of prominent figures from the world of culture (including, for the cartoons, Massimo Bucchi of Repubblica) and the movement for the rights of people with disabilities.
In January 2014 he exhibited his cartoons, illustrations and images, with texts by Enzo Costa, in the exhibition “You bet” staged at the Muvita of the Sipario Strappato theatre in Arenzano (Genoa).
In November 2014, the exhibition was inaugurated at the Museoteatro della Commenda di Prè “Between saying and drawing there is the sea”, a compendium of the works of the "partners" EnzoCosta & Aglaja, on the theme of the sea and hospitality, with satirical-dreamlike digressions: it was the last, happy, occasion that saw the "partners" Aglaja and Enzo together, who passed away a few days after the inauguration.
After Enzo Costa's passing, Aglaja ceased her work as a satirical cartoonist (except for the occasional "extravaganza"), preferring to devote herself to digital painting, where she brings her surreal world to life. In September 2015, once again at the Commenda di Prè, Aglaja inaugurated her first solo exhibition: “How deep is the sea,” the imaginary depths of a static traveler.
In March 2017, during the event Equinox of the Arts (World Poetry Day and European Day of Early Music), the presentation of the exhibition took place at Palazzo Tursi “Ligurian Writers: Imaginary Portraits, Imagined by Aglaja”, The exhibition resumed in June and was hosted at the Palazzo Ducale during the Genoa International Poetry Festival.
In September 2017 a new exhibition opens at the Museo del Mare in Genoa, entitled Imaginary backdrops, the underwater photos of nature photojournalist Adriano Penco revisited by Aglaja's imagination.
Aglaja collaborates with La Rivista Intelligente (www.larivistaintelligente.it/) web magazine directed by Giovanna Nuvoletti, and with the related Facebook page (www.facebook.com/larivistaintelligente) with her own stories illustrated by herself, humorous columns, drawings and cartoons.
She is curating an archive of her partner's works, publishing and illustrating previously unpublished pieces and poems on her social media pages and in La Rivista Intelligente.
She continues to be a resilient teacher and an unrepentant designer. And vice versa.
Adriano Penco Born in Genoa, Camogli is now a resident of the city and lives in Recco. He is a member of the Ligurian Order of Journalists.
He began diving in 1981 and became a PADI diving instructor and diving center director in 1985, before moving into underwater photography and journalism.
Among the photographic awards bestowed upon him, the most prestigious are linked to the 1991 World Festival of Image Sous Marine, the Isotta Trophy in Lazise, the Exhibition of Faenza Masters and the Press Award in journalism in 1998.
Among his editorial output, noteworthy are: in collaboration with Emilio Carta, Ships and Wrecks, Vols. I, II, and III; co-author with Tina Leali Rizzi of Armìe di Portofino and Liguria in Blu; author of From Zero to Minus Sixty, Islands of Liguria, diving guides to the Aeolian Islands and Elba. Illustrations that help highlight the seabed and the qualities of our underwater world.
He was co-author of the “Immersioni d'Autore” project created for the Liguria Region-Tourism Department, and in 2007 author of the “Quaderno dell'Area di Tutela Marina” created for the Municipality of Porto Venere.
His shots are collected in the illustrated publication “100 Ans de Photographie Sous-Marine”, in the work entitled “Fotocinemafotografia Subacquea Italiana: i Protagonisti”, and in Japan in the prestigious monthly magazine Marine Diver.
On the occasion of its 500th anniversary, Mondo Sommerso presented him with a splendid biography that places him among the most outstanding contemporary artists.
He has also collaborated as a photojournalist with Sub, Mondo Sommerso, Aqva, Bell'Italia, Bell'Europa, Dove, Marevivo, Legambiente, La Sapienza University of Rome, the University of Bologna, the Italian National Institute of Geo-Vulcanology, the Bernabò Brea Archaeological Museum of Lipari, with the Archaeological Superintendency of Liguria and Tuscany, among the newspapers with Il Secolo XIX, Avvenire and finally with IANTD Expeditions, an organization specialized in historical/archaeological underwater expeditions.
From 2008 to 2012 he was Director of the “Guide-Sub” series published by Magenes of Milan, and before that he was Press Officer for the magazine Aquageographia published by Aquapress by Heiko Bleher, a periodical distributed throughout the world.
Between 2006 and 2010 he was invited to present his photojournalistic work on television programmes such as: Linea Blu – Rai; Pianeta Mare – Mediaset; PrimoCanale – Liguria
" My roots are in the earth, my branches sink into the sea", he likes to emphasize when he talks about himself.
In his images, he always seeks to highlight movement, elegance, and the relationship between man and animal. A tender bond, one that places both in a joyful sharing of the underwater world.
“For me, photography represents the means to stop the moment and tell the world, its beauties”, aaffirms. "To bring subjects closer, to which I simply need to add a touch of art, creativity, and interpretation. Through photography, we can capture the movement that is life, and an artist's job is to restore that life, even if the image is viewed a century later."
