The exhibition was inaugurated on Friday, May 16, by Emanuela Bruni, President of Fondazione MAXXI; Marco Minniti, President of Med-Or Italian Foundation; Letizia Colucci, Director General of Med-Or Italian Foundation; and Viviana Panaccia, curator of Mediterranea. Among the attendees were Massimo Claudio Comparini, Managing Director of Leonardo’s Space Division, and Milena Lerario, CEO of e-GEOS and Head of the Geoinformation Line of Business at Telespazio.
Mediterranea is a journey through the memory of the peoples of the Great Sea, its myths, and its present. Conceived to give voice also to the shadows, contrasts, and challenges that currently affect the region, the exhibition aims to represent the "sea between the lands" in all its complexity. It does so through storytelling that blends unpublished satellite images provided by Telespazio and e-GEOS, extraordinary photographs, videos, and immersive installations with significant works on loan from the Museum of Civilizations, the National Etruscan Museum of Villa Giulia, the National Roman Museum, the Italian Geographic Society, the Sicilian Region – Sea Superintendency, and selected pieces from the MAXXI Collection.
It tells the story of a long-standing crossroads of trade, but also of fertile cultural exchanges, of coastlines rich in crops, of islands long known for tourism but in the past sometimes places of exile — and today, landing points for migrants.
Originally conceived for Matera European Capital of Culture 2019, the exhibition later began its international tour promoted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and now sees its final stop in Italy at MAXXI.
The exhibition path of Mediterranea. Visions of an ancient and complex sea unfolds across four thematic areas. It begins with a journey through time that retraces the great civilizations and key historical moments, from Phoenician and Greek colonization to Roman dominance, from Arab expansion to the modern era. In the "History of lands and waters" area, ancient maps, such as the Mediterranean nautical charts by Francesco Oliva and Giovanni Battista Cavallini from the 17th century, are displayed alongside unpublished satellite images and a Roman ship’s rostrum from the fleet that defeated the Carthaginians in 241 BCE, loaned by the Sicilian Region – Sea Superintendency.
The section dedicated to the “Peoples and cultures” of the Mediterranean explores trade routes and the great migrations through language and writing — primary tools of encounter, exchange, and connection. On display are: the head of Ulysses (early Imperial age) from the Statili burial site in Rome, now at the National Roman Museum, symbolizing the archetypal traveler; a modern copy of the three gold tablets (6th century BCE) discovered in 1964 at Pyrgi on the Etrurian coast, housed at the National Etruscan Museum of Villa Giulia; and a spiral amphora from Capena (7th century BCE), currently at the Museum of Civilizations, all evoking the birth of the phonetic alphabet in Syria and its transmission to the Mediterranean peoples. A site-specific sound installation allows visitors to listen to the extraordinary variety of languages, dialects, and voices from the Mediterranean region.
Through multimedia, interactive tools, and immersive installations, the third area of the exhibition invites visitors to experience the richness of “Vegetation and scents” typical of the countries surrounding the Mediterranean — one of the most biodiverse areas on the planet.
The exhibition concludes with a look at the “Mediterranean today” and the current crises caused by human pressure, documented by satellite images that unmistakably reveal the signs of change. Contemporary art — with works such as Mare Vostrum by Nicolò Degiorgis (2017), Artificial Symmetry by Camilla Gurgone (2019), and Radici mobili by Luca Trevisani (2021) — offers new reflections on the challenges of our time.
