Sara Rossi

The photographic series ABC by Sara Rossi consists of an alphabet of advertising signs scattered in the suburbs of some cities in Northern Italy. It is an investigation into borderline and transit places, between the countryside and the city, along viaducts and ring roads. The images arise almost spontaneously, as if there were a meeting between an external causality and an internal purpose, capable of generating a strong symbolic and metaphorical value. The encounter between the text of the signs and the urban space, poised between banality and stereotype, gives shape to an archaeology of marketing, of which the images are the ruins of a past that persistently survives the wear and tear of time. In this photograph, a building structure in a state of disrepair, in evidence a sign reading ENTRA.

The photographic series ABC by Sara Rossi consists of an alphabet of advertising signs scattered in the suburbs of some cities in Northern Italy. It is an investigation into borderline and transit places, between the countryside and the city, along viaducts and ring roads. The images arise almost spontaneously, as if there were a meeting between an external causality and an internal purpose, capable of generating a strong symbolic and metaphorical value. The encounter between the text of the signs and the urban space, poised between banality and stereotype, gives shape to an archaeology of marketing, of which the images are the ruins of a past that persistently survives the wear and tear of time. In this photograph, a close-up shot of apartment blocks in a suburb. The word MARIO stands out.

The photographic series ABC by Sara Rossi consists of an alphabet of advertising signs scattered in the suburbs of some cities in Northern Italy. It is an investigation into borderline and transit places, between the countryside and the city, along viaducts and ring roads. The images arise almost spontaneously, as if there were a meeting between an external causality and an internal purpose, capable of generating a strong symbolic and metaphorical value. The encounter between the text of the signs and the urban space, poised between banality and stereotype, gives shape to an archaeology of marketing, of which the images are the ruins of a past that persistently survives the wear and tear of time. This photograph shows a semi-abandoned building reflected in a pool of water. The word RATTO is prominently displayed on the roof of the building.

SARA ROSSI realises works in which she combines the use of technology with the recovery of archive material – postcards, photographs, home videos – in stories suspended in an atemporal atmosphere. At the centre of her poetics is the natural landscape, with its transformations and historical stratifications, the reworking of space halfway between imagination and reality and a style rich in iconographic references to art history. Among her main works are Carosello (2005), a 60 metres-long line of vintage postcards; Lanterna magica (Butterfly Heaven) (2011), a video installation where the colours and movement of butterflies expand in the space, transmitting the impulse of nature into becoming; Otto (2008), documentaries, original films, family memories, a metaphor for an infinite time machine. She was awarded the “DARC-MAXXI” at the 50th Venice Biennale (2002-2003). *She was born in 1970 in Milan, where she lives and works.