Five Photographers Subvert Pictorial Genre Hierarchy in Milan Exhibition

The exhibition "The Subject Matters" at Viasaterna in Milan, curated by Luca Fiore, presents 47 works by five photographers from 1992 to 2023. The show challenges the 17th-century hierarchy of pictorial genres, where history painting and portraiture were considered superior, while landscape, still life, and scenes of daily life were deemed minor. The photographers—Takashi Homma (Japan), Vanessa Winship (UK), Terri Weifenbach (USA), Gerry Johansson (Sweden), and Guido Guidi (Italy)—focus on these so-called lesser subjects, elevating them through poetic treatment. Fiore explains that the title plays on the ambiguity of "subject," suggesting that the more trivial the subject matter, the more the artist's agency matters. Guidi presents a 2016 work and pieces from his MAXXI exhibition "Col tempo." Winship's images from her book "Snow" depict a desolate Midwest winter, evoking Nordic painting. Weifenbach's four new works (2019–2021) feature vibrant color scenes from Paris's Jardin des Plantes and Butte Chaumont, contrasted with a black-and-white photo from her Washington DC garden. Homma's conceptual series annually captures the sea from the same point on Oahu's North Shore, measuring time. Johansson's ten black-and-white photos from "Spanish Summer" reference straight photography and New Topographics like Robert Adams. The exhibition runs at Viasaterna in Milan.