Gabriele Basilico. Ambiente urbano 1970-1980

A precursor to his celebrated Milano. Ritratti di fabbriche, Gabriele Basilisco’s Ambiente urbano project, realized between 1970 and 1980, is crucial to understanding his entire oeuvre. Documenting burgeoning public housing, capturing children and workers in the streets, away from the grandeur of monumental historic buildings, Basilico swiftly found the perfect starting point for studying and deciphering the essence of the city, always a central theme in his work. In this sequence, his photographs follow one another like shards of a polycentric movement. They are chronicles of time, aiding our perception of the landscape in a durational perspective and offering up vistas of a multifaceted, stratified city composed of overlapping times, emerging unexpectedly. The captivating power of these images invites us to perceive the history from which they spring, and to envision the future they herald.

Italian / english edition. Translation by Adam Victor for Scriptum, Rome.