Genoa: the story of a port city and its hinterland

Abstract

The work of Cora Piantoni explores the period before the Fall of the Berlin Wall and the political upheaval at the end of the Cold War. Her practice involves interviews with participants originally involved in historical processes, as well as re-enactments from the past through moving images engaging with socio-political situations. In the following discussion, Piantoni takes seafaring as a starting point to ref lect on interconnected maritime stories. Seafaring brings together a variety of viewpoints, experiences and connections among dif ferent worlds. Seafarers brought back to port cities stories, objects, and ideas from their passages across the seas. Navigation with its imaginative and speculative potential has long generated myths and legends. In ref lecting on storytelling at the heart of the port city, the artist draws from its use of imagination, construction and reinvention in the recollection of historical events. In 2015, Piantoni spent half a year in Genoa. Here, she recalls the people and the stories that she encountered in the Northern Italian port city.