A tale of welcome. The Teobaldo Fenoglio centre for asylum seekers in Settimo Torinese Photographs by Uliano Lucas

Uliano Lucas describes life in the “middle zone” of welcome centres. Beyond the voyage by sea, beyond wearying arrivals to the shore, he brings his camera into the place where the naked and famished person finds a tent or a house and tries to find hope again for rebuilding a life. 70 highly impacting images, set out on large panels, recounting life at the welcome centres, all filtered by the eye and camera of internationally famed reporter Uliano Lucas.
The images become a tool for knowledge and for discovering an unknown world for most, telling a story made of humanity and solidarity, an example of virtuous management.

Lucas presents the organised system for assistance within the Teobaldo Fenoglio centre in Settimo Torinese, run by the Italian Red Cross. He shows everyday routine in the “village” inside and out of the centre: healing and educational activities, socialising moments, the motivations and skills present, doctors, operators, teachers, the migrants themselves involved in assistance for new arrivals. And furthermore, meeting areas outside the centre: the Archimede Library, technical schools, Italian language courses, the mosque and other places for worship.

It is a sociological inquiry which fixes the aspirations of who arrives, who departs and who looks at it all, on photography paper, everyone as a citizen in his own way, in a territory where he dwells and lives in, just for the time it takes to rise again.
The pictures displayed and the book, published by Mudima Editore, become tools for knowledge, for reflection and discovery, in the face of the non-knowledge that generates hostility and fears. They talk about a virtuous example of the way in which assistance may be run in the case of the “humanitarian emergencies” of these years, linked to escapes from countries branded by war or by indigence, and at the same time they offer a sensitive testimonial about the wounded and suspended lives of young men and women, families and children who are seeking the possibility and the right of imagining and building a future once again through their voyage over the Mediterranean.

In consideration of its high worthiness, the exhibition has been awarded with the ‘President of the Republic Medal’.

The exhibition and the book are a project by the City of Settimo Torinese, by the Italian Red Cross and by the National Cinema Museum in Turin. The exhibition is organised with the patronage of the Ministry for cultural heritage and activities and for tourism, of the Piedmont Region and the City of Turin, with contributions by SPRAR - Protection system for asylum seekers and refugees, and the Casa dei Popoli Association in Settimo Torinese. Project collaborators: the Fondazione Comunità Solidale Onlus, the Rete Città della Cultura, the Fondazione Promo P.A. and the Fondazione ECM.