08/09/2025
Lagazuoi EXPO Dolomiti opens its doors to a new photographic exhibition, showcasing the works of four emerging young artists who reinterpret the theme of the mountains with a personal and innovative perspective
Saturday, September 6, the award ceremony and inauguration will be held in the gallery at 2732 meters above sea level, open until October 19.
Giorgia Armas from Arbus won first prize with the project "I have never been so attached to life": a re-reading full of poetry and hope of the traces of the First World War
Filippo D'Eugenio from Forte dei Marmi, through very close-up shots, isolates and enhances short landscape segments, revealing their aesthetic value
Patrick Scilabra from Parma recounts transformations and memories, opening up a perspective on the possibilities of a balance between human beings and the environment
Chiara Sugaroni from Rome, always attentive to the human subject and their experiences, observes the high mountain by immersing herself with respect among the people who animate these places
Cortina d'Ampezzo, September 8, 2025 - The fifth edition of the Lagazuoi Photo Award New Talents photographic exhibition opens. In the exhibition space at the arrival of the Lagazuoi cable car, between Cortina and Alta Badia, the visions of four young photographers take shape, who have made the mountain the subject of authentic and personal visual stories: the Lagazuoi thus becomes the origin and landing place of photographic research united by the desire to offer a new look at the landscape of the Ampezzo Dolomites.
From among the 35 candidates from the Officine Fotografiche di Roma, the Istituto Italiano di Fotografia and the CFP Bauer - AFOL Metropolitana di Milano, the jury selected four young artists to spend five days on Mount Lagazuoi and create photographic projects inspired by the mountains. Their works are now at the center of the exhibition inaugurated on September 6 at the Lagazuoi EXPO Dolomiti and can be visited until October 19.
The jury decided to reward the research work and originality of Giorgia Armas' proposal. "Although she was the youngest in the group, Giorgia showed maturity, strong poetic skills, stubbornness, as well as courage in declining one of the densest and most complex photographic subjects, such as that represented by the legacies of the Great War".
21-year-old Giorgia from Arbus (South Sardinia) won the award with the project "Non sono mai stata tanto attaccata alla vita" (I have never been so attached to life) by reinterpreting Lagazuoi through its historical traces. Tunnels, trenches and remnants of the Great War become the living material of a visual narrative capable of intertwining memory and present. Starting from the vertiginous beauty of the Dolomite landscape, the photographer retraces the history of the mountain, highlighting its dual nature. If "Lagazuoi is a divided mountain, a theater of war and a scenario of pure beauty, a place of memory and a tourist destination", the project has the primary purpose of "narrating this duality, inviting you to observe the mountain from multiple points of view". The most personal segment of the project sees split and inverted shots that give rise to light and poetic visions that lower the narrative of today with a message of hope for the future.
Filippo D'Eugenio, 31, from Forte dei Marmi (Lucca), with the project "Di tempi e materie" ("Of times and materials") proposes a series of isolated visions, micro-landscape components from which the Lagazuoi seems to emerge. As the photographer explains, "rock, wood, dust, and water are fragments of the identity of the place and together they constitute an intimate and changing portrait". His narration gives the sensation of an encounter of the different materials that make up the mountain, with the water cycle, with the seasonal rhythms or the long times of the modifications of the elements of the Dolomite context.
Patrick Scilabra, 34, from Parma, with the project "E se cambi, resterò con te" ("And if you change, I will stay with you"), observes the constant activity of the Lagazuoi cable car, a connecting point between seasons that flow without interruption. Mechanical components, cable cars, snow cannons and signs appear against the backdrop of a breathtaking panorama, like silent characters, potential protagonists of stories waiting to be told. His language has been able to recount transformations and memories, opening up a perspective on the possibilities of a balance between human beings and the environment.
Chiara Sugaroni, 23, from Rome, with the project "Pulsazioni" retraced the access routes to Lagazuoi, from the paths that wind through the territory, to the cable car, understood as arteries that pulsate and reunite like a "pulsating, millennial heart, a crossroads of cultures and an inexhaustible source of memories". Attentive to the human subject and the micro-stories she had the opportunity to observe, she immersed herself with respect among the people who live and animate these places, with a narrative dedicated to those who are engaged in the daily work that allows the cable car to operate.
"This year's theme is entitled 'Lagazuoi here and now: a photographic experience in three acts. Three directions we have given to stimulate young photographers to seek a new perspective between landscape and mountain life, without ever abandoning their imagination," explains Stefano Illing, creator of the Lagazuoi EXPO Dolomiti "Their creations are testimony to the value of the mountain territory and remind us that there is still much to explore at high altitude".
"Banca Private Cesare Ponti," emphasizes Mauro Toti, Head of the Northeast Area, "has once again welcomed the opportunity to support this initiative, concretely demonstrating its proximity to the territory and the strong link with social and youth issues, which have always been at the center of the commitment of the BPER Group, of which we are a part."
This year's edition boasts the collaboration and support of Closer – Bologna's Festival of Social and Documentary Photography, which every two years, with exhibitions by great authors, welcomes the collective of works by photographers selected through an international call and BAW – Bolzano Art Weeks, the collective festival created with the aim of giving a shared physical and temporal context to the contemporary South Tyrolean art scene. Some of the works of the Lagazuoi Photo Award will be exhibited from October 3 to 12 at the BAW at Castel Hörtenberg in Bolzano.
Exceptional tutors of this edition: the photographer Guido Samuel Frieri and the curator Nicolò Faccenda, who also designed the exhibition.
Guido Samuel Frieri comments: "The result of this residency is much more than a series of photographic works: it is the testimony of a shared journey, of individual and collective growth, of an open comparison between different visions, techniques and sensitivities. It is the sign of a future, for photography, which is still capable of amazing us." Nicolò Faccenda adds: "The residence on the Lagazuoi was an excellent opportunity for growth and multidirectional exchange. This happened on the technical, creative and poetic front, as well as on the human and relational front. Filtered by the gazes and discourses that saw it as the protagonist, the Lagazuoi was returned in a series of peculiar declinations, arising from a continuous contamination that saw all the people, all the environments, all the stories and the most specific characteristics of this context enter into a thrilling, exciting creative flow. The aim of the exhibition will be, first and foremost, to make the public part of this atmosphere".
The project is carried out with the support and partnership of BPER Banca Private Cesare Ponti, food partner Villani Salumi.
