The curtain falls today on the exhibition “Sea of Sicily and Tunisia from one coast to another”. Organized by the Associations Didon & Énée and I Colori della Vita, this exhibition lives its last day at the Sainte-Croix Cultural Center and will soon head on other destinations in Tunisia and Sicily. Supported by the Italian Cultural Institute of Tunis and by the cities of Tunis and Trapani, this meeting of ten photographers makes it possible to discover Mediterranean sensations as well as landscapes and faces of the two banks, between Sicily and Tunisia which are so close by history and geography.
Beyond the production of this major exhibition which also involved several patrons, it is important to note the nuances of each series of photographs which are intended to be narrative frames, real stories which tell the fluidity of the sea and also the reflections of the two banks.
Seven Italian photographers between two banks and eternity
Arturo Safina reaches six black and white shots, to grasp the work and the fishermen who in Trapani return to the port with their sockets and each day reproduce immemorial gestures. Between tenderness of the gaze and precision of the framing, Safina restores the deep truth of moments where fatigue disputes it to joy, on the immutable bottom of the port.
Maria Luisa Faraci walks for her part on the shores of Trapani and her surroundings. Between darkness and full sun, it captures the ocher grain of fortresses and headlights and knows how to linger on the chapelets of boats moored at the port and the lights of the city that sparkle in the distance.
Paolo Rizzo admits an ancestral link with Tunisia from which he runs along the ribs and carefully observes beaches and rocks. His photographic stories are as suggestive as a new or a poem and leave the way open to open readings. One of the most iconic images of this exhibition represents paper boats sailing on the grooves of a rock, between the folds of the stone which become waves. In colors and all in contrasts between blue, sand and sunset, Rizzo photos have a little of the soul of the landscape and also the memory of a child who has chosen the return to Tunisia for ten years.
Franco Scalia offers a series of headlights dotted on the Côte de Trapani. Admittedly, these are architecture photos but they make prints of height, loneliness and permanence in the landscape. A slender profile of the headlights, surrounded by all sides by the sea and drawing the distant are at the heart of this series where black and white sublimates concrete and stone.
For Simona de Togni, a day at sea is the ideal pretext for establishing a marine universe where fishermen, their hands raising nets, their silhouette standing out on the open sea and their faces immersed in the freight of lively water. Between Trapani and Favignana, these fishermen’s photos are silent and subtle hymns to the courage, effort and legendary patience of men who are devoted to the sea.
Tonino Corso is looking for the heritage of photographer Luigi Girri. He abstracts scenes at first glance banal, we could not be more ordinary. However, each photo carries a story, each reflection of light transcends a detail and represents the sea in its fluid immensity or populated by seated characters who scrutinize the distant or advance cautiously between the rocks. These are luminous wedding with the sea, in counterpoint with a laughing seagull, which perfected this world of Girri reread by Corso.
Matteo Garone finally tells in six photos his meeting with Beji, a Robinson of the beaches which from an early age, built dams against erosion. This young man facing the coast, building dry stone walls, recovering the discharges of the tide, respectful of the environment, arouses admiration and expresses our collective duty.
Exemplary, Beji is only physically present in two photos. Garone observes in the other clichés the shack in which this environmentalist lives in front of Pilau Island and the plastic tide murdering that he jugs his hands.
Three Tunisian photographers facing the sea and its symbols
Mona Fkih Khouaja participates in the collective exhibition with two series of photos. The first intended for the ancestral technique of the jumper mule fishing and the second to the charfia of the fishermen of Kerkennah. These two black and white series document and aesthetize at the same time. This is the tour de force of Mona Fkih Khouaja which shows beauty and truth, the sovereign sea and its laborers. In the first series, wearing blouses and hats, alone or in a group, faceless and sometimes like a shadow, the fishermen are struggling with the sea and their nets.
In the second series, the Palm Claies seem to be overgrowed by the chiaroscuro of the dawn, as bathed in a sea of milk that crosses a lonely boat. Between large and counter-angled plans, the photographer recites a light score and knows how to isolate each syllable voluntarily blurred or absolutely precise.
Skander Zarrad establishes a symbolic dialogue admirably illustrated by an aerial photo of Mahdia and the legendary Cap Africa. This dialogue between Sicily and Tunisia is amplified by the power of the landscapes seized by the photographer and also thanks to timeless scenes. The flight of a cloud of flamingos above the sea or a fisherman surrounded by boats, seated in front of nets to disentangle while the tangle of masts and hulls seems to respond to the complexity of the task of the fisherman: these are these complex scenes that Zarrad restores in surprising balances.
Finally, Kaouther Khedija Khouini offers two colored series and especially in black and white, at scum level, between salty and daily memory of Ghar El Melh and Djerba. A true inventory of the embracing of reality, the series combines the moving face of a fisherman, a boat bearing a female first name, two fish and a bridge, a forgotten wreck, hands that are active on an improvised establishment or even a motorcycle in front of a wall that one looks corroded by the spray. So many moments which by the narrative of the photographer become scraps of eternity.
