Text: Yiannis Vasileiou

At a time when photography has become part of the global flow of digital communications, Fondazione Prada unveils its new 800-square-meter exhibition space dedicated to question the cultural and social implications of current photographic production and its reception. Osservatorio, located in Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II in Milan will open its doors with the exhibition “Give Me Yesterday”, curated by Francesco Zanot that will run from 21 December 2016 to 12 March 2017. The show explores the use of photography as a personal diary over a period of time ranging from the early 2000s through today. The artists included have transformed the photographic diary into an instrument to focus on their own daily lives and intimate, personal rituals. In an era where the presence of photography devices is stronger than ever and the circulation of images completely uninterrupted, the photographs presented in “Give Me Yesterday” turn the immediacy and spontaneity of documentary style into an extreme control over the gaze of those who observe and are observed. Instant photography and exhibition photography are mixed in order to comment on our “photographic era”, and affirm individual or collective identities.

The show includes works by 14 Italian and international artists like Melanie Bonajo, Kenta Cobayashi, Tomé Duarte, Irene Fenara, Lebohang Kganye, Vendula Knopova, Leigh Ledare, Wen Ling, Ryan McGinley, Izumi Miyazaki, Joanna Piotrowska, Greg Reynolds, Antonio Rovaldi and Maurice van Es.