The Center for Contemporary Art Luigi Pecci in Prato presents, from Saturday, November 22, 2025 to Sunday, May 10, 2026, Luigi Ghirri. Polaroid ’79 – ‘83 curated by Chiara Agradi and Stefano Collicelli Cagol. Produced in collaboration with the Luigi Ghirri Foundation, this is the first exhibition in Italy entirely dedicated to the work on polaroids of the Italian photographer, the most famous in the post-war period.

Luigi Ghirri's research lies between a conceptual use of the medium and a construction of the image that evokes immediate empathy. Objects carrying memories, the complex stratification of the Italian landscape and the people who inhabit it are present in his photographs, providing a sense of familiarity and offering elements to recognize in the world he portrays. This recognizability of the subjects coexists with an analytical stance adopted by the artist. The questions and themes posed by his works are related to photographic technique: generating images where different temporalities coexist, the photographic composition that simultaneously excludes and includes, the doubling of reality inherent in photography, the unveiling of what remains unknown or invisible despite being in front of everyone's eyes every day.

The exhibition offers a wide selection of polaroids taken by Ghirri between 1979 and 1983. At the time, the Polaroid company had provided him with a large supply of films and cameras, introducing him to the use of instant development photography. Between 1980 and 1981, Ghirri was invited to Amsterdam, at the time the European headquarters of the company, to try the Polaroid 20x24 Instant Land Camera, capable of taking extra-large instant shots in just over a minute. The polaroids, small and large, reveal an unseen Ghirri. On one hand, the photographer who, at the end of the seventies, after a decade of rigorous conceptual and technical control of his photographs, embraces randomness.