
4.5 minute read
The works of Cemal Emden
from the Gazzettino
by Claudia Meschin
The fusion of ancient and modern, of natural and built environments, make Carlo Scarpa the perfect architect for this moment in which the preservation of historic buildings and sensitivity to environmental impact are of supreme importance.
The exhibition "Re-Fra- ming Carlo Scarpa" by Cemal Emden, set up in the spaces of L'ERA gallery, in Fondamenta de L'Arzere (Dorsoduro 2324), is entirely dedicated to the great Venetian architect.
The solo exhibition, curated by Emiliano Bugatti, features 30 large-format panels depicting as many works by Carlo Scarpa that the Turkish architect and photographer Cemal Emden, today among the most recognized in the world in the fields of architecture, interior design and landscape, has captured with his lens.
«His shots give the observer the opportunity to immerse themselves in Scarpa's works, to observe their details even from new points of view to capture, for example, perspectives and geometries visible only through a shot from above», explains Bugatti.
The photographs on display represent a small extract from the book "Carlo Scarpa. The Complete Buildings" containing 200 photos by Cemal Emden with related texts by Jale N. Erzen, a complete works published by Prestel recently presented in the Mario Baratto hall of Ca' Foscari.
To produce the book, Emden visited all of Scarpa's extant buildings, from those begun in the 1930s to those completed by his collaborators soon after his death in 1978.
The photographic panels exhibited in Venice were presented to the public for the first time on the occasion of the exhibition "Scarpa Diyaloglari" held in Istanbul in 2022 by the private association of architects ISMD together with the Italian Cultural Institute of Istanbul, with the aim of promoting Italian artistic culture in Türkiye.
With this in mind, L'ERA Gallery has brought Cemal Emden's photographs to Venice, Scarpa's city, investing heavily in the relationship between Istanbul and the lagoon city, two cities that have historically woven cultural and commercial exchanges and that even today confirm their closeness.
