«To my mother», Yvonne De Rosa recounts the war from the Nunziatella

After the greetings of the editor Roberto Nicoluccito discuss it with the author will intervene Stefano Causeart critic and professor of modern and contemporary art history at the Suor Orsola Benincasa University of Naples and Colonel Giuseppe Stellato82nd commander of the Nunziatella Military School. Readings by Peppe Lanzetta.

“To my mother” it is a journey down memory lane that listens to the stories of young soldiers who passed through the evocative walls of the Nunziatella Church in Naples, those who waited for them and the confessions of those who returned with a heavier heart. It is a meta-tale that collects sensations, dwelling on what young soldiers may have felt after the abandonment of the dearest affections, the combat and the loss of youthful light-heartedness to suddenly and inevitably become adults.

As evidence of that lost innocence, the title takes up the last part of the book which is dedicated to the long letter entitled “To my mother” from a young soldier whose diary – transcribed in the first part of the book – portrays him carefree and confident “to do his duty well” during the days of ‘training, but, once gone to war and captured by enemies, he invokes his mother’s name, hoping to ease his pain and soothe his wounds: « In every adversity, in the face of the hardest toils, even when it seemed to me that I was going crazy, it was enough for me to pronounce your sweet name so that I could get used to the hard destiny”.

“To my mother” it represents the real testimony of the photographer’s ability to go beyond the images, to restore the deepest sense of her emotions, to bring back stories that ask to be brought to light. In De Rosa’s photographic research the concept of objective correlative refers to the use of visual elements that evoke emotions rather than representing the subject as a connoisseur. Her work creates an emotional connection with the observer, in a desire for synchrony, to experience for a few moments what, guarded by a collective memory, remains timeless and is still energetically present today. «Yvonne De Rosa», writes Simone Azzoni in the preface, «reaffirms the value of truth and memory».

Yvonne De Rosa was born in Naples. After earning a degree in Political Science at the University of Naples Federico II, he moved to London, where he dedicated himself to the study of photography, earning a Post Graduate Degree in Photography at Central Saint Martins and a Master Degree in Photojournalism at the London College of Communications. From 2004 to today you have published, edited and exhibited your work in national and international contexts. Previous photographic monographs: Crazy God (Damiani Editore, 2008) presented at the Photographers’ Gallery in London and Hidden Identities, Unfinished. (Damiani Editore, 2013) exhibited at the Victoria&Albert Museum of Childhood in London. In 2015 she founded, in Naples, the Magazzini Fotografico association of which she is still the artistic director.