Marco Delogu, Massimo Reale
The thirty assassins
"How lovely is Siena fair when ten jockeys circle the Square going to the roped-off place ten assassins to start the race..." Thus goes an old Senese refrain. It would be hard to define these men in any other way. Twice a year they hurl themselves onto the volcanic pavement f the Campo di Siena in a horse race that isn't a sporting event but a war of symbols. The Palio is the Middle Ages live, not re-enactment.
Massimo Reale
Marco Delogu is famous for his portraits of composers, prison inmates, cardinals in retirement. Each of his books is the iper-portrait of a different human paradigm. This time he has turned his lens upon the jockeys of the Palio of Siena, offering us a personal and original group portrait. These jockeys look at us directly, straight on, their faces shade off and dissolve into the background, which is black and white, like the coat of arms of Siena. The book is a kind of Spoon River Anthology of jockeys, who speak in a few sentences recorded or plucked out by Massimo Reale, a horseman himself.
Alessandro Falassi
Marco Delogu was born in 1960 in Rome, where he still lives and works. His work focuses on portraits of social groups connected by common experiences and languages. He has published over 20 books and has exhibited his work in several galleries and museums in Italy and abroad, including the Accademia di Francia, Villa Medici, Rome; the Galleria Comunale d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Rome; Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome; the Warburg Institute, London; the Henry Moore Foundation, Leeds; IRCAM - Centre George Pompidou, Paris; Museé de l'Elysee, Lausanne; the PhotoMuseum, Moscow; the ex-GIL, Rome; and the Capitoline Museums, Rome. He is director of FotoGrafia, the international photography festival held in Rome.
Massimo Reale was born in Florence in 1966. A gentleman rider, for Punctum he has edited “Photofinish vol. II” and “Paesaggi romani con Tram e Bus”, and written a story featured in “Capalbio” and the texts for “Uomini, Terra e Mare” and “I Trenta Assassini”.
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