Borderline Modernity - Photography Exhibition by Giovanna Silva

About the event

Fundacja Archeologia Fotografii, ul. Chłodna 20, Warszawa 📅 Exhibition duration: 26.07.–07.09.2025 🎉 Opening: July 26, 6:00 PM Free admission. Opening hours: - Mon.–Thu. 11:00 AM–5:00 PM - Fri. 3:00 PM–7:00 PM - Sat.–Sun. 11:00 AM–4:00 PM Borderline Modernity is an exhibition by Italian photographer Giovanna Silva, who explores architecture and contemporary cities in Sicily and Poland. These two geographical areas on the outskirts of the European Union have a complex relationship with modernity and post-World War II architecture. In Sicily, this architecture is often associated with uncontrolled urban and industrial development, not devoid of fraudulent practices, while in Poland during the same period, architecture was also a political tool tied to socialist ideology. Giovanna Silva's photographic work offers an original and anti-monumental perspective on architecture. The artist seeks the essence of spaces and buildings in seemingly insignificant details that reveal the true life within them. Silva has photographed modern architecture in various cities in Italy and abroad, publishing numerous books on the subject. In recent years, she has documented modern architecture in Sicily, and most of her works have not yet been presented. The landscape captured by Silva includes bold and daring, sometimes quiet post-war architecture designed by local and foreign architects. It represents the idea of modernity that distances Sicily from stereotypes associated with its Greek, Roman, Arab-Norman, or Baroque past. The photographs of Sicily exhibited at the Italian Cultural Institute in Warsaw are connected to photographs dedicated to post-war architecture in five Polish cities – Warsaw, Wrocław, Kraków, Katowice, and Tychy – taken during the photographer's research trip from March to May 2025. In Poland, Silva examines socialist architecture created from the end of World War II to the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Her works interpret the architectural achievements of this period and its styles, from rationalism and socialist realism to postmodernism, contributing to the description of various political periods, from Stalinism to the rise of Solidarity. The photographic project dedicated to Poland is exhibited at the Fundacja Archeologia Fotografii, where Silva's photographs are juxtaposed with photographs of the same architecture by Polish photographers: Maria Chrząszczowa, Mariusz Hermanowicz, Tadeusz Sumiński, and Antoni Zdebiak, whose archives are preserved by the foundation, as part of an exhibition capturing the historical evolution of the photographed buildings. The exhibition is curated by Pietro Airoldi and Izabela Anna Rzeczkowska-Moren, members of the :AFTER group, whose activities focus on debates about architecture in Sicily. The photographic project between Italy and Poland is carried out by the Italian Cultural Institute in Warsaw with the support of the Directorate-General for Contemporary Creativity of the Ministry of Culture and the Italian Cultural Institute in Kraków. The exhibition is organized in collaboration with the Fundacja Archeologia Fotografii in Warsaw. The exhibition will be open in Warsaw from July to September 2025, and then in a renewed version will be transferred to the Italian Cultural Institute in Kraków, where it will be available from October to November 2025.