PHOTOGRAPHY/ The “port” of a larger story: Rome through the vivid gaze of Mohamed Keita
"Porto Roma" features photographs by Ivorian photographer Mohamed Keita of his Eternal City, open and vibrant. On view until July 27th.
A suspended Rome, made of fragments of places and fleeting encounters, is the one depicted by Mohamed Keita in the exhibition PORTO Roma. Curated by Carmen Pilotto, the exhibition is promoted by the Department of Culture of Rome Capitale and Azienda Speciale Palaexpo. It is open until July 27, 2025, in the spaces of the former Mattatoio di Roma.
In the photographer's story, the Eternal City appears far removed from the stereotypes and glossy images familiar to the general public. There's no sensationalism, no monuments taking center stage. What emerges is instead a mosaic of everyday life composed of lights, shadows, and faces.
Through Keita's gaze, Rome becomes the stage for the alternation of ordinary lives and solitudes, which the artist watches pass by. The common thread of the visual narrative is the streets, "a central point from which to observe the city," says the photographer, because it is there that "many realities intertwine with their contradictions , for better or for worse."
The exhibition's title encapsulates the artist's personal vision: Rome is both a port of arrival for those arriving from abroad, as was the case for the photographer, originally from the Ivory Coast, but also a point of departure and passage.
The city is a threshold, capable of opening to new horizons and meanings, but also " a haven of the soul ," the organizers explain in the press release, "where the ancient dialogues with the present, humanity merges with the silence of spaces."
The exhibition also establishes a dialogue between Mohamed Keita's past and present. Some of the photographs on display date back to the photographer's first stay in the city. These are juxtaposed with more recent images that explore the present of the same places, conveying to visitors their transformation and thus crystallizing the passage of time.
"Each photograph is a fragment of memory, a snapshot of the Rome experienced by the artist," explains the curator in the exhibition catalog. "Rome," Pilotto continues, "is thus revealed in its changing, welcoming, and resilient essence, like a stage where histories, cultures, and humanity intertwine timelessly."
Anyone who has lived in Rome knows this feeling well: feeling like a passing by, watching a story bigger than ourselves unfold. And within this story unfold the many small stories that combine to create that kaleidoscope of moments and contrasts that is the unique beauty of this city.
The choice to chronicle Rome is no coincidence. It was in the Eternal City that Keita unexpectedly encountered photography. This vocation was consolidated through his studies at the Roberto Rossellini Cine-TV Institute and the Exusphoto photography school, and led the young photographer to hold several exhibitions, not least the show dedicated to Women and Girls in Sub-Saharan Africa (2022), displayed at the United Nations Headquarters in New York.
Today, Keita divides his time between Rome and Bamako, Mali, where he works on various projects. One of these is Studio KENE in Bamako, a photography workshop for children from the suburbs, sharing their learning and offering an alternative to the road and travel.
The photographer's sensibility and history emerge from the images on display. Keita depicts a multiethnic and evolving Rome. "A vibrant and vibrant Rome," as Luigi Bartone and Felice Castrignanò, coordinators of Mosaico Studio, who curated the exhibition, define it. The exhibition encompasses the entire city, from the center to the outskirts, without focusing on the social differences of the places, but rather providing a coherent and personal narrative.
“A legacy of moments ,” the architects add, “that speaks to us of constant change and collective memory, of the fragility that makes us human, and of the beauty that can blossom anywhere.”
Photographer Luigi Ghirri said that what you choose to exclude from a photograph is as important as what is portrayed, because in the invisible the image continues, bringing reality to light even if not directly represented.
The fragments of pavement, the broken faces, depicted by Keita do just that: they open the doors to the visitor's imagination, allowing him to retrace his own "Rome" and, at the same time, breathe in an incredibly real and contemporary city.
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