Viaggio A Roma (Journey to Rome) is a 13 minute video in six episodes. The work wants to create connections between the architectural, political, social and religious layers of the 2,700-year old city, not through a tourist’s lens, but rather approach it from a Roman’s perspective. In doing so, the work has become a personal reflection taking us from well recognizable places to lesser-known areas of the city, merging my interest in history, Art history and urban landscapes. Here, we are invited to revisit Rome’s rich past as well as consider its present. For this project, I shot more than 5,000 stills and video footage, over a span of two months during the summer of 2012.

Episode I of the video is made of three different “views”: Views of the Tiber River 1712-2012, Views of the Roman Forum 1683-2012 and Views of S. Maria in Aracoeli 1816-2012. A “veduta” (view) is a painting representing a cityscape, a natural place or some other characteristic scene as it is, without manipulation or fantastic invention. Rome has been the subject of these paintings since the late 17th century and Gaspar Van Wittel, a Dutch painter who spent most of his life in Italy can be considered the founder of this analytical and objective way of representing reality. I selected the paintings seen in this episode after extensive research in Araldo De Luca photographic archive. I then revisited and photographed the locations represented. With exact positioning and through the addition and subtraction of key architectural and natural elements, we can witness what has changed and what remains over the course of time.

“Viaggio a Roma” was first presented in the former Public Art Museum in Grand Rapids, a space curated by Site Lab as a venue for ArtPrize 2012. At the end of this three weeks event, the work was selected and exhibit in the GRAM, Grand Rapids Art Museum, until August 2013.

A portfolio of prints was created along the video