Page 125 - Via Condotti

A versatile artist of photography, able to capture art, ar- A photographic journey immortalized in the book: “The
chitecture and interior design in a single click, Massimo World’s Most Beautiful Libraries”, able to reveal the in-
Listri, born in Florence in 1953, meets the publisher and trinsic, historical and architectural beauty of the oldest
important contemporary art collector Benedikt Taschen, libraries in the world. Scrolling through the images of the
thus giving a wide scope to his obsession of retracing interiors depicted we start a tour in history reliving the
the history of libraries of the world. Forgotten architectu- ancient atmospheres of the centers of medieval, clas-
ral beauties become the object of a journey to discover sical, baroque and rococo culture, reaching up to the
the mausoleums of knowledge as well as sacred places nineteenth century. There is no traces instead of con-
for the survival of culture and science. temporary libraries, as the photographer wants to create
a distance from the present as if he wanted to preserve
these beauties, trying to preserve the styles and preven-
ting any form of contamination.
Leaf ng through the volume, we can trace the prof les of
the ancient manuscripts, volumes, papyrus parchments
and the famous incunabula. The evocative images cap-
ture the uniqueness of every detail. Examples of this are
the papal collection in the Vatican Apostolic Library, the
Trinity College Library and the sensational Laurentian Li-
brary of Florence designed by Michelangelo. Continuing
the photographic journey we arrive in Austria at the Ab-
bey of Altenburg, in Peru with the Franciscan Monastery
of Lima and again in Portugal in the Library do Conven-
to de Mafra, up to Brazil with the Royal Cabinet of Rio
de Janeiro. Photographs with a double soul, descriptive
and capable of capturing the most ornamental details
of the places, but at the same time narrative as they are
able to tell through images the history of the most an-
cient mausoleums of knowledge.
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