In the evocative space of the Sala Biffi, the exhibition Mar d'essere | The Sea of Being, curated by Gigliola Foschi, presents three recent photographic series by Tina Cosmai – Lùdica, Nostalgia del Corpo (Body Nostalgia) and Attraversare il Tempo (Crossimg Time) – united by a vision of the sea as an inner universe, reminiscence, poetry and a reflection on our relationship with nature. Based on the delicacy of the tones, where lightness is combined with a vein of melancholy, the works of Mar d'essere | The Sea of Being, as the title suggests, fuse the interior and the landscape in a suspended time, similar to that of an enchantment.
In the Ludica series, in front of a sea that almost merges with the sky, balloons, flying pins and rocking horses appear as if by magic, rising up into the blue and evoking childhood games and memories. These works seem to want to transport us on a flying machine that takes us back to the time of childhood and, at the same time, to a today that is motionless in its elusiveness, where the sea always watches us like a backdrop suspended in a time of waiting.
In Nostalgia del corpo (Body Notalgia) – where fleeting little girls appear, little dresses emptied of their bodies, little dresses immersed in the sand or suspended in the air – Tina Cosmai reminds us with a light touch of how our very existence is impermanent, yet can hover like a tenacious memory.
In her series Attraversare il Tempo (Crossing Time), the author scatters small traces in her seascapes, tiny details to be discovered as in a dreamy treasure hunt: abandoned fish half hidden in the sand, a bird's nest, nets that resemble light screens. Everything reminds us, beneath the surface, of our ancient relationship with the sea, when it was the cradle of animal life, the backdrop of ancestral rituals and our own lives. In one photograph in the series, a girl with her back turned gazes silently and enchanted at a small island in the distance: almost an invitation to a profound encounter with nature and a possibility of hope in the infinity of the sea.
An 'anomalous' artist in the panorama of contemporary Italian photography, Tina Cosmai has also attracted international attention for her light and at the same time profound images, similar to poems, created almost like paintings. The author blurs and brightens the tones through complex post-production work, making what is irrelevant to her visual message disappear and revealing what was not there, in front of her gaze, but stored in her memory, in her emotions. The result is works shrouded in a veil of tenderness that evoke deep feelings in the viewer.
