Marco Fiora was only seven years old when one winter morning in 1987 he was forcibly led into a car in a Turin suburb. From there he left for the rough and steep mountains of Aspromonte, in Calabria. They had to go through 519 days of hell until the young man was released, but not before his parents, owners of a garage and a bakery, had to face a million-dollar ransom. The police found him in a forest guard's cabin with the same shirt he was wearing the day he was kidnapped, torn and dirty. So weak that he couldn't walk. His left arm was marked by the scars left by the chains with which his captors held him. It was the longest and most distressing child abduction experienced in Italy. One of many perpetrated by the 'Ndrangheta, the most powerful criminal organization in Europe. Abductions that form the basis of Guilty Grounds, the latest project by Steffi Reimers (Netherlands, 1995).
Intermittently, over several months, the Dutch photographer traveled to the Calabrian mountain range in search of those remote landscapes, silent witnesses of the clandestine activities of the mafia, where between 1972 and 2012 654 kidnappings were carried out. The longest was 831 days. There were 28 kidnapped people who were found dead and 50 of whom were never heard from again. The number of kidnappings has decreased drastically in recent years in Italy. However, fear survives and manifests itself in many ways; There are few who dare to break the omerta, or law of silence. The activities of the criminal organization remain active and maintain a monopoly on wholesale drug distribution in Europe. Last November, 200 defendants were sentenced to a total of more than 2,200 years in prison in Italy for their links to the 'Ndrangheta during one of the largest mafia-related trials in decades.
Between 1972 and 2012, 654 kidnappings were carried out in Calabria. The longest was 831 days. There were 28 kidnapped people who were found dead and 50 of whom were never heard from again.
Guilty Grounds offers a critical reflection on the impact of crime on society and the landscape, through an approach that runs between fiction and reality. It can be seen in its exhibition format in the museum foam from Amsterdam. The publication is divided into three parts: two of them are built based on historical material, press clippings related to different kidnappings that are presented alongside archival portraits of convicted victims and perpetrators, as well as a series of photographs, in white and black, about the investigation and rescue work.
In between, a disturbing color tour through silent places, dark tunnels and dilapidated bunkers that will serve to recreate the suffocating atmosphere that surrounded six specific cases. Dark places where the shooting that ended the life of Carmine Tripodi, commander of the carabinieri corps in San Luca, still seems to resonate, who in his desire for justice, after carrying out risky investigations, was assaulted and shot, while driving back to home. Through the use of cold forensic lights, the author manages to reveal evidence that otherwise could not be perceived with the naked eye, taking the viewer through nightmarish paths and disturbing beauty, impregnated by the smell of oregano, an aroma that the teenager Pierangelo Bolis was able to distinguish, hooded throughout the twenty days that his captivity lasted.
The photographer has chosen to dispense with the human figure to focus on the territory as a silent witness to a series of offenses
Reimers alludes to the landscape's ability to retain memory. The trace left behind by passers-by means that, thirty or forty years later, one can still relive their presence. Hence, the photographer has chosen to dispense with the human figure to focus on the territory as a silent witness to a series of offenses. A landscape, in a certain way, guilty, for offering shelter to criminals within its bland geography. Even so, it is not the author's intention to find the truth of what happened in those inhospitable settings, but rather to awaken different sensations in the reader so that he himself can imagine what happened – or did not happen – there, while keeping alive the memory of facts that should not be forgotten, denied, or silenced. In short, a brave story that flows nimbly through paths of harsh beauty, history and morality.
The book is presented in a box that bears the image of a virgin: La Madona di Polsi, also known as the Virgin of the Mountain. Every September 2, the leaders of 'Ndrangheta go to their sanctuary to hold a meeting where hierarchies are agreed upon, alliances are sealed and wars are declared. A perverse devotion that aims to protect and unify the family nucleus and also rebuild it through terrible revenge.
In Ciudad Juárez, 3,951 murders were recorded in 2010; at a rate of more than ten a day, in a city of 1.3 million inhabitants dominated by drug trafficking cartels
In 2010, Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, became the most violent city in the world, when 3,951 murders were recorded in that year alone; at a rate of more than ten per day in a city of 1.3 million inhabitants dominated by drug trafficking cartels. Homicides that were regularly reported on by the national press, especially the red notice newspapers that display death in a sensationalist manner, entertaining as well as terrifying the population through morbidity. To this period of extreme violence, which spread throughout the country, and lasted until 2016, alludes The portrait of your absence, the last photobook published by Alejandro Luperca Morales. A project that was forged in those days, while the author lived in the Mexican city, where it was common to witness scenes of violence in the middle of the street and in daylight.
Inspired by the essay Jean Baudrillard The transparency of evil, and disconcerted by the grotesque sensationalism of the criminal press, which usually presents the most brutal events along with sexual content, the author began to compile clippings from the sensationalist evening newspaper P.M More than 500 photographs showing the bodies of the victims of those murders. Images that the photographer will select, scan, enlarge and crop and later make the corpses disappear manually using an eraser, in order to offer a critical reflection.
The author echoes the vocabulary of horror, or 'narcoñol', a term coined by anthropologist Rossana Reguillo to refer to the jargon that has been adopted to talk about organized crime.
A way to oppose indifference to evil and its trivialization through the normalization of this type of content that is consumed episodically and amnesiacly. “This morning they found a stiff man,” “It was no use running,” “They took out his brains,” or “They liquidate brothers” are some of the headlines that accompanied the images in the newspaper and that the author uses as titles. of the new versions, echoing the vocabulary of horror, or narcoñola term coined by anthropologist Rossana Reguillo to refer to the jargon that has been adopted to talk about organized crime.
The publication opens with an index of images arranged by titles and dispenses with all text so that the reader stops in that clear space – where in turn the text printed on the back of the newspaper is transparent, inviting different readings. A pause that the photographer offers the viewer in order for them to question why these types of images have stopped surprising them and take into account the degree of strangeness of what we experience in our society. A blank space that aims to restore dignity to the protagonist of the photo, regardless of the moral judgment he deserves, while remembering the power of our imagination when it comes to fueling the machinations of evil.
It is only on the last page where we will find the image of a corpse, the same one that makes up the lenticular cover of the book and plays with the disorienting effect of the images. The photographer will go one step further, saving the remains of the erasure as if they were ashes, granting that death a more intimate character and an opportunity for mourning. Some remains that he presents in the form of an urn in the exhibition format of the project.
'Guilty Grounds. Steffi Reimers'. Exhibition at the Foam Museum. Amsterdam. Until March 3.
'Guilty Grounds. Steffi Reimers'. Self-published. 18 pages, 59 euros.
'The portrait of your absence'. Alejandro 'Luperca' Morales. Kult Books / The Submersed. 112 pages. 39 euros.
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