The Italian Cultural Institute in Cairo, with the support of the Directorate-General for Contemporary Creativity of the Italian Ministry of Culture and in collaboration with Art D’Égypte, has presented the exhibition “Geography and Mystery”, curated by Alessandro Castiglioni, at the Graeco-Roman Museum in Alexandria, Egypt. The exhibition is dedicated to the photographic work of Marina Ballo Charmet and Stefano Cagol.
The exhibition project emerged from research conducted both in Italy and at the Bibliotheca Alexandrina in Egypt. It establishes a dialogue between two leading figures of contemporary Italian photography—Marina Ballo Charmet and Stefano Cagol—and the themes of physical geography, archaeological discoveries, and historical traces that intertwine the past and future of the Mediterranean.
Marina Ballo Charmet is one of the most important living Italian photographers. Her work focuses on everyday life, approached with a mobile, slightly out-of-focus gaze that creates a floating, peripheral vision, drawing from the preconscious. Stefano Cagol is an artist, researcher, and curator known for his geopolitical exploration of places and experiences, expressed through travel and performative practices. It is particularly significant that the exhibition is hosted at the Graeco-Roman Museum, founded in 1891 at the initiative of Italian Egyptologist Giuseppe Botti.
