The Third Island

THE THIRD ISLAND TRIENNALE, MILAN DECEMBER 1-20, 2015 OIGO n.1 The Third Island Edited by Antonio Ottomanelli Planar Books, 2015 240 pp (book) +42 (booklet)/38 [euro] In the post-photographic era, where image dissemination on the internet has made billions of images, from satellite photography to Instagram, readily available, is there any meaningful room left for documentary photography with a strong social bent? A new, ambitious project by OIGO (International Observatory on Major Works), a collective of photographers, argues in favor of the affirmative, with a book and traveling exhibition curated by Italian photographer Antonio Ottomanelli, titled The Third Island. Its first installment, The Third Island, brought together photographers and writers in 2014 to focus on the impoverished region of Calabria, and particularly its often failed infrastructure, which is frequently the first thing Italians think of when they hear the word "Calabria." The goal is to prod politicians, city planners, and citizens to take a critical look at the long-term effects of such building projects on the economy, environment, and landscape. The Third Island culminated in an eponymous book publication and a collateral photo exhibition at the Triennale International Exhibition in Milan (December 1-20, 2015) and amalgamated a kaleidoscope of voices and contributions. The next show (December 13, 2016-February 14, 2017) is expected to open in Rome at the National Graphics Institute in December 2016 with some new, additional shots by photographers Armando Perna and Maurizio Montagna. The focus of the investigation stemmed from Ottomanelli's participation in the Monditalia section of Rem Koolhaas's 2014 Venice Biennale of Architecture, where participants were invited to reflect on Italy as a "case study" within the coordinates of architecture. Calabria, the toe to Italy's boot, has an ignoble reputation for its large number of unfinished construction projects that dot the horizon, its hotels and illegal villas that stand as concrete skeletons overlooking the Mediterranean and, most notably, its highways. Geographically, the region is dominated by rugged mountains. Promontories impede on the shoreline. Such majestic yet inhospitable terrain has helped make Calabria one of the least developed areas in the country, which in turn makes it vulnerable to the 'Ndrangheta, the local mafia that today stretches the width of the globe, generating billions of euros every year in illicit trade. The region remains largely unknown also to most Italians. "When we hear about Calabria, it's usually on the news, because of some legal orders or mafia-related facts," said Ottomanelli. "We're accustomed to a certain rhetoric in the way the region is portrayed, which has generated a very static perception at a collective level." (1) But with The Third Island, OIGO has taken it upon itself to research and document this problematic territory without sensationalizing it. The group consists of eleven individual photographers, one collective of two photographers, and a growing list of dozens of intellectuals and journalists. Their project presents us with a variegated and fragmented land, whose heterogeneous character is underlined by the plurality of personal languages and accents that each photographer and writer brings to the effort. The photographs of Andrea Botto, Allegra Martin, Montagna, Perna, and Filippo Romano (to name only a few) mix with archival material and with written texts. An analogic dictionary, compiled by such thinkers and practitioners as Teddy Cruz, Marco Ferrari, and Pelin Tan, is appended at the end of the volume, and proposes unconventional and unexpected definitions of what may constitute a "major" piece of infrastructure. "The aim was to promote a reflection on today's Italy by investigating its landscape," Ottomanelli told me, "and through this process, initiate a cross-disciplinary rumination on the theme of major infrastructure. …