Steve McCurry ICONS, Exhibition Ferrero Palace, Biella

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Steve McCurry ICONS

From 6 December to 18 May 2025

Ferrero Palace

Corso del Piazzo, 29, Biella

Opening soon: at 10:00

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Biella Creative City Unesco welcomes the exhibition UPLANDS&ICONS dedicated to Steve McCurry, one of the most famous and appreciated photographers of our time, from December 6, 2024.
The 128 shots set up at Palazzo Gromo Losa and Palazzo Ferrero, until May 18, 2025, are divided into two sections: in the first one, the photographs taken in the so-called High Lands - the UPLANDS - from Tibet to Afghanistan, from Mongolia to Japan, from Ethiopia to Burma, from Nepal to Brazil; in the second one, the most representative photos of McCurry - the ICONS: among these, the famous portrait of the Afghan girl with green eyes, taken in 1984 in a refugee camp in Peshawar, portraying Sharbat Gula. The photo, which has become a global symbol of the refugee condition, strikes for the intense and penetrating gaze of the young girl, to whom McCurry has never failed to support, helping her and her family escape from Afghanistan in 2021.
The exhibition project, curated by Biba Giacchetti, tells the uncontested essence of the mountains, life swinging between danger and resource, distant places united by a poignant beauty; and then it takes the visitor among the portraits of Afghan guerrillas, Tibetan shepherds, African tribes, and the absorbed faces of young women in distant and boundless lands.

THE EXHIBITIONThe extraordinary career of Steve McCurry takes off with a reportage on the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.Still young, the photographer left disguised in local clothes, without documents, armed only with a Swiss army knife and his cameras, hidden in a canvas bag, to join a group of Mujaheddin for weeks, crossing mountains, in exhausting marches with the most extreme climates, to reach the heights where the guerrillas resisted thanks to their knowledge of the territories.Back home with the rolls sewn into his clothes, the reportage first narrated to the rest of the world the situation in Afghanistan, and the mission earned him the Robert Capa Gold Medal and worldwide fame: in his shots, the Afghan people emerge endowed with unwavering determination, yet always kind and steadfast.
Even in his investigation of Buddhism, it is once again the Asian altitudes that accompany McCurry in his research. The relationship with the Tibetan people, with those faces "that have different proportions, colors, measurements - recalls the great photographer - but above all the ability to tell an existence, a way of life," is a physical experience that tells a story of dedication and spirituality, a deep contrast with modern life and the external world, which McCurry skillfully returns in some of his most beautiful and impressive shots.
It is to this spirit of the mountain, its sacredness, its landscapes and inhabitants that the exhibition is dedicated, through the narration of McCurry's travels, from Afghanistan to Tibet, from Mongolia to Japan, from Brazil to Burma and then again in the Philippines, Morocco, and Yemen; at Palazzo Gromo Losa, over 100 images ranging from the first missions to the most recent stages of his tireless exploration of the world.A report through boundless landscapes, marked faces, intense gazes, symbiosis between peoples and animals that play crucial roles in ensuring human survival.
The section dedicated to his most well-known photos, to his Icons, is then set up at Palazzo Ferrero, with over 20 extraordinary shots, accompanied by extensive biographical documentation and a series of videos in which the photographer recounts the principles underlying his extraordinary career.

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	opens - closes	last entry
monday	10:00 - 18:00
tuesday	10:00 - 18:00
wednesday	10:00 - 18:00
thursday	10:00 - 18:00
friday	10:00 - 18:00
saturday	10:00 - 18:00
sunday	10:00 - 18:00

Steve McCurry ICONS

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