Artist Bio
Sergio Attanasio (Catania, 1994) is a documentary photographer. After completing his studies in Political Science and Euro-Mediterranean Relations he joined CESURA photography collective, where he worked for nearly four years as studio assistant and assistant photographer. He later joined Divergence Images collective. After documenting the COVID-19 pandemic in Sicily, he worked on photo reports in Lebanon, Syria, Moldova, and Colombia. His work has been published by El País, The New Arab, Al-Jazeera, Wired ME, Libération, and L’Espresso, among others. His interests include history, armed conflicts, Europe, and the SWANA region. He is currently based in Damascus, Syria.
Statement
INNER SEA
Inner Sea explores the shores of the Mediterranean through multiple perspectives: Western and Eastern, Southern and Northern; perspectives of conflict, negotiation, and encounter. It is a sea of conquests and adventures, but also a sea marked by resistance and hope.
We perceive the Mediterranean as our own: a safe space, almost a possession, always available for our vacations, for sunshine and relaxation. We consider it the most beautiful of all seas: close by and, at times, exotic; Latin and European. We know that this sea holds a history stretching back millennia, a continuous succession of encounters and clashes between civilizations. But we also know that we inhabit the “modern” and “privileged” shore of this region, and this reassures us.
Yet that reassurance easily falters when we encounter someone we perceive as different from us; when we hear about the violent protests in Libya; when the Palestinian issue erupts once again in bloodshed; when a boat loaded with migrants sinks off the coast of Lampedusa.
We change the TV channel or swipe to the next reel on Instagram, and once again we find the “slow life,” the beaches and parties of the Greek islands overrun by tourism. Thus, profound contradictions emerge, causing us to oscillate between a Homeric, idealized past and the rigidity of the present. We feel ill-equipped to understand a world in which Southern Europe is also the Near East; in which North Africa mirrors Latin America; in which the Atlantic Ocean seems as vast as Asia.
Some Western authors – including Fernand Braudel, Albert Camus, Predrag Matvejević, and Franco Cassano, theorist of “Meridian Thought” – have studied and critiqued this geography. But we must also listen to the voices coming from the southern shores of this shared sea: African, Arab, Turkish, and Berber writers, thinkers, and intellectuals. Before the introduction of the modern Arabic term Al-Mutawassit (“the sea in the middle”), of Latin origin, the Mediterranean was often called, among other names, Rumi (“the sea of the Byzantines,” “the sea of the Christians”): a definition that reflects a certain distance—and at times even fear—toward the Other.
Through these photographs, I seek to offer a personal reflection on this long journey—a journey destined to traverse various places along both shores of the Mediterranean
