AN EVENING WITH THE AUTHOR: LAURENCE CHELLALI AND EMANUELA PATELLA
TUESDAY 11 FEBRUARY 2025 AT 7 PM
China, photography, tradition and current affairs, history and contemporaneity: movement, discovery, meeting, dialogue and connections with other realities and territories.
On the occasion of the Finissage of the exhibition COLLAPSED the author Laurence Chelalli together with Emanuela Patella, Scientific Director of the CELSO Institute of Oriental Studies – Asian Studies Department, will try to delve not only into a photographic journey, but also in the geography, history, the traditions, the contemporaneity, the contrasts, the characters and the anecdotes of the country that acted as host for Chellali’s works on show, China.
Environmental and ecological development in China has been largely influenced by the teachings of Taoism. The classic book of this religion, the Daodejing, states that individuals are part of the whole and seeks to develop their well-being in this context. Furthermore, it proposes a vision of life based on the spontaneous simplicity that comes from following nature.
Laurence Chellali, a French artist who has lived in China for several years and has always been interested and close to nature and climate change, for her COLLAPSED project she did not have to try to imagine what the world could be like in the future following the devastating effects of climate change, with digital renderings, some where between science fiction and harsh reality or creating imaginary frames and dystopian scenarios, which could come from the latest science fiction film or Roland Cat’s visionary paintings. Crossing vast areas in the north of China, including the Gobi and its inexorable desertification, these scenarios portray the world already present, a world that is undoubtedly visually fascinating, but which turns out to be extreme, dark and disturbing as if projected in a not too distant future.