Pitshanger Manor and Gallery
Exhibition
Underground - travels on the global metro
Photographs by Marco Pesaresi
Exhibition now finished (Fri 7 April —
Sat 13 May)
Marco Pesaresi’s astonishing photographic study
of the world’s UNDERGROUND systems, is shown for the first time in the UK. For
18 months in the 1990’s, Pesaresi traveled the world to capture the life
teeming beneath the streets of London, Milan, new York, Calcutta, Tokyo, Paris,
Mexico, Berlin, Madrid and Moscow. Here for a few cents, centimes, pesos or a
lot of pence, anyone can take a global trip and encounter people from every
culture, every walk of life, every state of mind.
The award winning Pesaresi was born in Rimini, Italy in 1964
and has worked for Agenzia Contrasto in Rome since 1990. His work generally
focuses on the most difficult of social topics -immigrants, drugs, prostitution:
life on the edge. Whilst living in London in the early 90s, traveling regularly
on the Tube, he became fascinated by the life he encountered there and began to
photograph the world underground. Later assignments in Milan and Berlin meant he
pursued his idea further and support was finally secured, enabling him to
complete his project in 10 major cities of the world.
In UNDERGROUND
Pesaresi captures the businessmen and beggars, clowns and lovers, children,
soldiers, who descend beneath the city streets to mingle and disperse, live and
pray, laugh and fear. Caught scurrying through labyrinths of steel, concrete,
and marble, splashed with garish lights, Pesaresi manages to see beneath the
poses and attitudes to reveal the individuals beneath. The preoccupied boy and
girl in Moscow are not the lovers we find in Berlin. The girl dreaming before
the circus poster in Madrid is very different from the Tokyo children merrily
juggling too many school bags. The solitary man, ascending the stairs at King’s
Cross, red balloons flying from the handrail, conceivably creates a singular
remembrance of the terrible loss of life in the King’s Cross fire. Yet amidst
the roar of trains and the speed of lights, a special, shared urban intimacy
arises. In these pictures, subway riders everywhere will find both the people
they try to avoid every day and fresh visions of themselves. If they look long
enough, they may find new insights to their own daily sojourn beneath the
surface of the world.
"1 wanted to explore the world, and most of a/Il was in
search of freedom. In every city I found a different story, but in each one!
found a cosmopolitan society living underground. In this society, you could go
anywhere. You could talk to everyone. Everyone was equaL It felt to me a little
like a parallel world where I began to feel free."
- Marco Pesaresi
Project conceived by Marco Pesaresi for Agenzia Contrasto,
Roma
The book UNDERGROUND -travels on the global metro with
introduction by Francis Ford Coppola, on sale at Pitshanger Manor Gallery for
the duration of the exhibition, price £22 (hardback).
Pitshanger Manor & Gallery
Walpole Park Mattock Lane
Ealing London W5 5EQ
ADMISSION FREE
Times
Tues - Sat 10am to 5pm Closed Bank Holidays
Tel 020 8567 1227 Fax 020 8567 0595
e-mail: pitshanger@ealing.gov.uk
Travel
BR and Tube: Ealing Broadway (10 minutes
from Paddington)
Buses: 207,65 & 83
Wheelchair Access. Lift service available in museum
.
Limited on-site parking for orange badge holders by
special arrangement.
