Brutta Figura, Learning Tuscany 2024

The photographs in Brutta Figura were made during the six-week Learning Tuscany summer study abroad program. Informed by an intensive art history curriculum that investigated the historic role of pilgrimage in Italian art and culture, students were tasked with photographically examining the contemporary iteration of pilgrimage: global tourism. Instead of simply reproducing the stereotypical views of Tuscany that proliferate in film, coffee-table books, and tourist snapshots, students sought to make compelling and challenging representations of this complex landscape. By investigating the intersection of old and new and by imbuing quotidian scenes with drama and intrigue, students used photography to question the nature of perception, value, and beauty.

This exhibition is part the Fieldwork Project series, dynamic collaborations between faculty and students in the Department of Art and Art History that take on a range of forms and enable the ideas and processes developed in the classroom to be brought into the public sphere.

Brutta Figura is organized by Eli Durst, Associate Professor of Practice in Photography & Media and Studio Art faculty for the 2024 Learning Tuscany program.