The thematic section of the Exhibition The Images of Fantasy 38 is dedicated to the forest: a place of allegory par excellence, the protagonist of classical and contemporary literature, of visual production, of popular and mythological tradition.
Space of discovery and initiation, but also of loss and darkness, its crossing always implies a transformation.
The passage through the wood reveals itself as a life experience and finds perfect fulfillment in the dark Dante’s forest, as an indispensable moment towards knowledge. Hence the ritual and symbolic variants of literature and art interpreted by the characters engaged in facing the wonderful journey.
“Literature and illustrations build an allegory of knowledge: we are fragile and small creatures linked to the state of reason and instinct which – explains the curator Gabriel Pacheco in the text in the catalog – at a certain point in life, manifest the need to forest, that is, to turn towards knowledge”. *
* Gabriel Pacheco, “Buscare nel bosco”, in “The Images of Fantasy 38”, catalog of the International Exhibition of Illustration for Children, Tapirulan Editions, 2020
Illustration by Matthew Forsythe, from the book Pokko and the Drum, published by Simon & Schuster (detail).
