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Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival | Surviving Humanity | Alberto Giuliani

scotiabank contact photography festival

2022 05 01 contact photo fest surviving humanity alberto giuliani

 

The Istituto Italiano di Cultura is pleased to support Alberto Giuliani at the 2022 edition of the Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival.

SCOTIABANK CONTACT PHOTOGRAPHY FESTIVAL 2022

Surviving Humanity

Alberto Giuliani
Photographer

Bonnie Rubenstein
Curator

May 1, 2022 to May 31, 2022

Allen Lambert Galleria
Brookfield Place
181 Bay St | Toronto ON

Monday to Saturday | 6AM to 2AM
Sunday | 9AM to 2AM
Holiday hours may vary

FREE EVENT | OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

CLICK HERE TO VISIT THE SCOTIABANK CONTACT PHOTOGRAPHY FESTIVAL WEBSITE

Presented on free-standing walls positioned throughout Allen Lambert Galleria, this installation by Italian photographer and journalist Alberto Giuliani focuses on forces at work across the globe to safeguard ecological and societal longevity. Shown in the heart of Canada’s financial district, distinguished by its towering skyscrapers and economic prosperity, the artist’s incisive works open a dialogue about the future of the planet.

Underscoring the urgency of environmental action, this selection of images from the series Surviving Humanity (2018) and their accompanying texts resonate with the glass atrium of the Brookfield Place galleria, commonly described as the “crystal cathedral of commerce.” Framed by the building’s steel support structure, which evokes a forest canopy, the installation confronts the question asked by Giuliani’s children that motivated his extensive explorations: “How will the world be when we grow up?” In the following statement, he elucidates the project.

“my life as a journalist and explorer revolved around a single goal—to find a way to defy death, and in broader sense, to learn how the massive changes facing the planet were being addressed. For the first time in world history, these changes were jeopardizing the survival of a large part of the population. After all, there was a prophecy for that too—humankind itself was said to face extinction.

In pursuit of such answers, I crossed the globe (… cancellato….) and the steps I took led to the cities of the future, havens deep in the earth’s core, safe from outside cataclysms. The things I learned, and the people I had the privilege of meeting—scientists, luminaries, astronauts, researchers, visionaries, politicians—were more than anything I could ever have imagined.

They all agree that for the first time in our history we risk going extinct. Deforestation, desertification, war, migration, global warming, unprecedented famine, will bring human existence to an end. The meteorologists at Ny-Ålesund, the permanent research institute at the northernmost location in the world, all said it; American millionaires are in no doubt about it and have already purchased a home in one of the luxury underground bunkers built to provide shelter from the apocalypse; NASA astronauts frequently say it, having spent years studying how to survive on other planets when our own forces us to abandon it.

But we know all this already.. What we still have to fully comprehend is what we’re doing to assure our survival in the future, and what the future of our species might be.. Surviving Humanity explores the many things science is doing to prepare for our future, from cloning to biospheres, cryo-preservation, and genetic experiments, taking the viewer to places in which the last remaining humans are mounting the ultimate resistance.

I met with NASA astronauts heading for Mars, the inventors of Japan’s humanoid robots, and people freezing themselves until they can be reborn. I lived with guardians of the climate at the North Pole, talked to people hoping to redeem mankind and save the world’s forests under huge glass domes. I spoke to scientists who built an artificial sun more powerful than the real one and met with politicians who aim to save biodiversity by locking it in a bunker. I’ve seen people ready for the apocalypse, eaten transgenic fish and vegetables that don’t exist in the natural world, crossed paths with researchers who clone, snip, and re-stitch DNA at the vanguard of eugenics. I sought guidance from all of them and asked my questions about the future. But like me, all they can do and are doing is looking for a way to defy death.

ALBERTO GIULIANI

For many years, photographer and journalist Alberto Giuliani has explored scientific innovations and the efforts underway across the globe to safeguard ecological and societal longevity–from biospheres to cloning, cryopreservation, and genetic experimentation. 

Bonnie Rubenstien, Artistic Director – Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival

  • Organizzato da: Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival
  • In collaborazione con: Istituto Italiano di Cultura Toronto | Brookfield Place