La Casa dei Tre Oci
Willy Ronis – Photographs 1934-1998
La Casa dei Tre Oci is paying tribute
to the great French photographer Willy Ronis (1910-2009). Curated by Matthieu Rivallin and produced together
with the Jeu de Paume in Paris and the Mediathèque de l’architecture et dupatrimoine, Ministere de la Culture, with the participation of the Fondazine di Venezia, and organized by Civita Tre Venezie, until January 6,
the exhibition presents 120 vintage images, among which about 10 previously un-exhibited
ones devoted to Venice, which range
over the whole career of one of the major interpreters of twentieth century photography and a protagonist of the French humanist tradition.
The Bastille Lovers – Paris – 1957
Emanuela Bassetti and Denis Curti
Self-Portrait in My Father’s Studio 13 Boulevard Voltaire – Paris
1935
Destined
for a career as a violinist, Willy Ronis
started working in his father’s local photographic studio; besieged by
creditors he abandoned it when his father died in 1936. Encouraged by his
friends Robert Capa and David Seymour, he became a
reporter-photographer and the euphoric witness of the Popular Front coalition in France.
Curator - Matthieu Rivallin
Francois Cali – Sortileges de Paris – Paris – Arthaud
1962 – publication
Through
his images, Ronis developed a kind
of series of micro-tales, with their starting point in the people and
situations found on the streets and in everyday life and that led him to be
captivated by reality and to observe the fraternity of peoples.
Aubagne – France – 1947
Italo and Laura Zannier
Willy Ronis,
Ministere de la Culture / Mediatheque de l’architecture et du patrimoine /Dist
RMN-GP copyright Donation Willy Ronis – courtesy Tre Oci
Vincent sur la route des vacances – 1946
Le Petit Parisien – 1952
Emma Morosi
Holiday Camp – Marsac – France – 1937
Jeanne and Jacques near Paris – 1937
Luca De Michelis
Willy Ronis,
Ministere de la Culture / Mediatheque de l’architecture et du patrimoine /Dist
RMN-GP copyright Donation Willy Ronis – courtesy Tre Oci
Willy Ronis – Fondamenta Nuove – Venice - 1959
Venice – Original Contact Prints – 1938
In
1938 Willy Ronis found a job as a
photographer on a cruise ship. The ship
stopped off in Venice where the
photographer took the opportunity to discover the town with his Rolleflex. Although he was awarded the Gold Medal at the Biennale di Fotografia in 1957, he only returned to Venice again in
1959 invited by critic Romeo Martinez. He took advantage of this trip to make some
of his most famous images of working class neighborhoods. Playing with the Venetian light, he captured solitary characters, a man with a Panama in front of a shoemaker’s shop
or the silhouette of a little girl on a jetty standing out in the twilight.
Calle della Bissa – Venice – 1959
Volendam – The Netherlands – 1954
Drinks and Music in the Courtyard
Willy Ronis,
Ministere de la Culture / Mediatheque de l’architecture et du patrimoine /Dist
RMN-
GP copyright Donation Willy Ronis – courtesy Tre Oci
“All the attention is fixed on a unique moment, almost too good to be
true, which can evaporate in the next second and provokes a feeling that is
impossible to obtain using staged artifices.”
Willy Ronis – June 1956
Willy Ronis – Place Vendome – Paris – 1947
Lou Embo Roiter
Willy Ronis,
Ministere de la Culture / Mediatheque de l’architecture et du patrimoine /Dist
RMN-
GP copyright Donation Willy Ronis – courtesy Tre Oci
Willy Ronis – Le Nu Provencal – Gordes – 1949
Jean Blanchaert
Pit 10 - Courrieres near Lens – Pas-de-Calais - France – 1951
Miner suffering from Silicosis – Lens – France -1951
If it is
true that Ronis’s photos correspond to a certain extent to an optimistic vision
of the human condition, he never tried to hide social injustice, and he was
deeply interested in the poorest classes.
His sensitivity in the face of everyday battles for survival in a precarious professional, familial, and
social context, reveals that his political convictions as a militant communist
led him to active involvement through the production and circulation of images
of the workers’ condition and battles.
Rue Laurence-Savart – Menilmontant – Paris -1948
Willy Ronis,
Ministere de la Culture / Mediatheque de l’architecture et du patrimoine /Dist
RMN-
GP copyright Donation Willy Ronis – courtesy Tre Oci
Willy Ronis – Usine Lorraine-Escaut – Sedan – 1959
La Casa dei Tre Oci
Willy Ronis – Photographs
1934-1998
Even
though the greater part of Ronis’s
most reproduced images were shot in France, from his youth on wards he continued
to travel and photograph other places. His style remained intimately linked to
his experiences and his way of thinking about photography. In fact he never
hesitated to evoke his own life and his political and sociological context. His
images and his texts tell of an artist who first of all wanted to explore the
world, secretly spying on it, and patiently waiting for it to reveal its
mysteries. To his eyes it was more important to receive the images than to go
in search of them, to absorb the external world rather than to capture it and,
from this point, to construct its story.
Dinner in the Garden and Library
Drinks and dinner were served in the library and the garden of the De Michelis’s residence in Venice on a warm summer’s night.
Drinks and dinner were served in the library and the garden of the De Michelis’s residence in Venice on a warm summer’s night.
Hosts - Emanuela Bassetti, Luca and Giulia De Michelis
Silvia Dainese, Paola
Marini, Laura and Italo Zannier
Giandomenico Romanelli and Ziva Kraus
Cristiana Costanzo and Ezio Micelli
Silvia Dainese, Giulio
Manieri Elia and Roberta Battaglia
Ambretta Senes
Federica Olivares, Emanuela Venturini and Carlotta Sapori
Lorenza Zanuso and Denis Curti
Stefano Gris and Marino Folin
Chiara Valerio and Marcella Libonati
Mario Lupano and Maria Luisa
Frisa
Roberto De Feo and Adele Re Rebaudengo
with Freya
Good
Night