A tribute exhibition on the occasion of Federico Fellini’s centenary, his cinema and our tradition, through the gaze of the photographer Elisabetta Catalano.
The Ri-tratto Rosso exhibition was presented last February (2020) at the Teatro1 in Cinecittà, Rome. Commissioned by Archivio Elisabetta Catalano, organized and promoted by Cinecittà with the artistic direction of Emanuele Cappelli, today – after a year – we celebrate the publication of the catalogue published by Manfredi Edizioni.
On December 14th, 2021, at Casa del Cinema in Rome in front of a packed audience, Camilla Cormanni, Responsible for International Cultural Events Cinecittà S.p.A., Barbara Goretti, Director of Cinecittà Exhibition and Educational Department at Cinecittà S.p.A, Aldo Enrico Ponis, Director of the Elisabetta Catalano Archive, Emanuele Cappelli, Curator, Teacher, Designer and Artistic Director, Laura Cherubini, Professor and Art Historian and Raffaele Simongini, Professor and Film Historian, presented the new catalogue. The meeting was mediated by Marlon Pellegrini, Press Officer at Cinecittà S.p.A.
The photos of Elisabetta Catalano, from those contained in the catalogue to those exhibited in the exhibition, can perfectly recall an era, a cinematic tradition, the Italian culture of Dolce Vita.
By creating the catalogue, we wanted to honour a retrospective that, due to the pandemic, has not been practically possible to visit. This collection wanted to recount the successful meeting between two “image hunters”: a photographer, with her continuous, insistent search for faces and expressions to capture with her camera, and the great director, capable of giving shape to fantasies, dreams, visions.
Aldo Enrico Ponis – Director of the Elisabetta Catalano Archive
When I first entered the Archives of Elisabetta Catalano and witnessed the photographic portraits of Federico Fellini, I immediately sensed a time that had passed. This gave rise to my desire to re-experience that period. Therefore, since Federico Fellini is synonymous with magic, and photography has the ability to stop the moment, this exhibition manages to bring that past time back to life.
Emanuele Cappelli – CEO & Creative Director, Cappelli Identity Design
This was just the very beginning, the starting point for the research and design of the exhibition “Ri-tratto rosso. Elisabetta Catalano looks at Federico Fellini”. The exhibition, curated by Emanuele Cappelli and organized by Istituto Luce Cinecittà, received the contribution of DG Cinema and Audiovisivi and the collaboration of Archivio Elisabetta Catalano.
The main focus of the research was to restore that Fellini-like dreamy and visionary mood, through color and sound effects. I imagined the best way to translate that atmosphere and make sure that everyone could understand it. I let a space speak and I filled it with time.
Emanuele Cappelli
The entire concept of the exhibition revolves around time. And it is light that Emanuele Cappelli chooses as the key element to transform Cinecittà’s Teatro 1 into a space that seems suspended in time, and that is filled with that distinctive Fellini’s atmosphere. Once spectators step into the exhibition, they are presented with immense portraits of the Maestro, supported and alternated by gigantic orthogonal panels representing the walls of a cathedral, a religious tribute to the great Fellini
This is an open but intimate space, where images and words are discovered by visitors. Finally, this itinerary is completed by the original installation of Catalano’s studio, left just as it was for Fellini’s last portrait.
In this corner one can catch a glimpse, in a voyeuristic act, of the intimacy of the last shot: what an unprecedented gift for the audience of Cinecittà.
Emanuele Cappelli
