GirovagArte. Fotografie di Samanta Sollima

From the city suburbs to the heart in Rome, the accessible beauty of the capital in the 42 portraits of people with disabilities signed by Samanta Sollima.

An exhibition about the emotions of the encounter with art but also the adventure in re-drawing a map of accessible culture in Rome through the GirovagArte project, the guided tour programme of the Associazione Handicap Noi e gli Altri born in 2018.

In Samanta Sollima's portraits, the sensations experienced deep down by visitors and their families emerge in the framework of the stops visited over four years: from the Musei Capitolini to the Museo di Roma in Palazzo Braschi, to the Chiostro del Bramante and the Basilica di San Paolo Fuori le Mura, in addition to the Musei di Villa Torlonia, the Centrale Montemartini and the Mercati di Traiano Museo dei Fori Imperiali; but also the Abbazia di San Nilo in Grottaferrata and the street art of Tor Pignattara. Locations chosen not only for their great varied history and beauty but also based on accessibility requirements, thus selecting and mapping those places whose facilities are most easily accessible to persons with motor disabilities.

The project, conceived by Rocco Luigi Mangiavillano of the Handicap Association Noi e gli Altri – operating for 35 years in the Tor Bella Monaca area – was created to promote the use and the accessibility of the places of culture and art in Rome and its surroundings, for people with disabilities, socio-economic disadvantage and with a high risk of social exclusion and marginalisation. With this initiative, realised also thanks to the financial support granted by the Otto per mille (Eight per thousand) of the Chiesa Valdese, the Association wished to weave connections between the periphery and the centre, using art as a medium and entrusting beauty with the task of breaking down the invisible barriers that determine the dynamics of marginalisation and social exclusion.

Samanta Sollima was born and lives in Rome. She worked for about ten years for film and television as an assistant director, developing and applying her passion for photography with set photos, portraits of actors and backstage photos. Her first photographic project "Vita sulle Punte" in collaboration with Officine Fotografiche, a finalist at the Sony World Photography Awards, was the subject of several personal exhibitions. As a portrait and stage photographer, she has collaborated with various theatres, including the Teatro Parioli and the Teatro di Tor Bella Monaca in Rome, the Teatro della Pergola and the Teatro Comunale in Firenze. An active member of the voluntary sector, she has collaborated for years as a photographer with the Associazione Handicap noi e gli altri.

The non-profit Social Promotion Association Handicap Noi e gli Altri was officially founded in the 8th District in 1987 thanks by a family doctor, a biologist and a civil aviation pilot. Under the twenty-year leadership of a person with disabilities, together with the active collaboration of social workers and volunteers, the Association established its headquarters in the Tor Bella Monaca district with the aim of building a territorial network for the protection of the rights of persons with disabilities, with the commitment to create spaces of solidarity, collective initiatives, meetings, projects and social activities. The Association exclusively pursues purposes of social, human, civil solidarity and cultural promotion.