The Red Balloon

Aperture is pleased to release two limited-editions in support of Short Stories: Photographs by Paolo Ventura (2009), crafted by the artist in his studio in Italy. Each suite of pictures is presented in a special design box produced by the artist.

Paolo Ventura’s Short Stories are whimsical narratives told through pictures—tales of love, war, and family—where things magically appear or disappear, set in an imaginary past of World War II Italy. Much like in silent films, the drama unfolds with no words 
or captions. For these works and those featured in the publication, Ventura constructs life-sized sets, in which he situates himself and members of his family (casting his son, wife, and twin brother as actors) in stories that are at once charming and disquieting. While seemingly simple, Ventura’s vignettes come with larger implications: brothers who encounter each other by surprise on the battlefield, jugglers who appear from above, a man who packs himself into his suitcase, a small-town magician who accidentally makes his son disappear for real, and many others. Here, Ventura has built a world of realistic proportions and actors, in fantastical tales and against painted backdrops—challenging notions of what is real and what is make-believe.

Featured here are special print editions of two of these tales, Man with Suitcase #2 and The Red Balloon. Each is featured in the book, which collects the entire series of Ventura’s Short Stories together for the first time, including three previously unpublished, and offers a glimpse into the artist’s extraordinary imagination.

Five Archival Pigment Prints, presented in box hand-crafted by the artist
Image Size: 11 3/8 x 7 5/8 inches
Paper Size: 11 5/8 x 8 1/4 inches
Edition of 10
One print in each suite is signed and numbered

Paolo Ventura (b. 1968, Milan, Italy) studied at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera in Milan in the early 1990s. His work has been exhibited internationally, including at the Forma International Center for Photography, Milan; Museum of Contemporary Art of Roma (MACRO), Rome; The Hague Museum of Photography, The Hague; Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna, Rome and during the Rencontres de la Photographie, Arles. In 2012, he was selected to create a series of works for the Italian national pavilion at the 54th Venice Biennale. He also received a commission from the Museum of Contemporary Art of Rome. And recently, Ventura was invited for a commission by the MART, the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of Trento and Rovereto, Italy. Four monographs of Paolo Ventura’s work have been published: War Souvenir (Contrasto, 2006), Winter Stories (Aperture and Contrasto, 2009), The Automaton (Peliti Asociati, 2011), and Lo Zuavo Scomparso (Punctum Press, 2012). He is represented by the Weinstein Hammonds Gallery in Minneapolis, Minnesota; Flatland Gallery, Amsterdam; and Edwyn Houk, New York. Ventura currently lives and works in Milan.