Petra Noordkamp - La Madre
29 June - 2 September 2012
In the project La Madre, photographer and
filmmaker Petra Noordkamp (1967) shows her most recent, not
previously exhibited work. The impetus for La Madre was
Noordkamp's short relationship in the mid-1990s with Emilio
Quaroni, son of the well-known Italian architect and urban planner
Ludovico Quaroni. After her contact with Emilio deteriorated,
Noordkamp discovered in 2001 that Emilio had murdered his own
mother in the same year. The violent story of Emilio and the
matricide stayed with Noordkamp - for years she thought about doing
something with it. The form of the project remained vague for a
long time, until two paths unexpectedly converged. In 2009,
Noordkamp visited Sicily for her photo project Cinecittà ,
and there she encountered the modernistic La Chiesa Madre.
This extraordinary, white spherical church turned out to be a
design by none other than Ludovico Quaroni, Emilio's
father.
Noordkamp's fascination for Italian modernist
architecture and her short romance with Emilio came together by
chance. The church, located in the town of Gibellina which was
devastated by an earthquake in 1968, provided the link to unite all
involved: the ex-lover, the father who was also the architect of
the church, the matricide and of course Noordkamp herself.
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