During the last three months of Autumn, since, in other words, the previous issue of our quarterly magazine was published, a significant new chapter has been written in the world described by Roman Walks.
At the end of September, we presented the symposium on “What makes a photo beautiful” and the tableau vivant “The Dream of the Roman Slave Market”, told by the images that you will see in the pages that follow. That event had been thought up by the president of Zetema, Francesca Jacobone (who was to be among the protagonists). Francesca, who contributed as author in the last issue of our magazine and was the protagonist of the interview in the previous issue, passed away suddenly a few days before our meeting.
From the pages of this magazine, the memories, the appreciation and the gratitude of all the editorial staff go out to her. In October, at the hotel Donna Camilla Savelli of the VOI Group in Trastevere, we started to plan this latest issue of our magazine. Finally, in November, we met with two great Roman families from the world of hotel hospitality: the Bettoja and the Roscioli families. It is to them that we have dedicated this new issue, recounting, through recollections and images, the adventures of Angelo Bettoja and of Giuseppe Roscioli, and the fascinating stories of their hotel Mediterraneo and hotel Universo. The entrance of Roman Walks in the hotels of the two circuits marks a new phase, a second year of publication that heralds a significant presence in the world of tourism. Tourism that is told through the eyes of Beauty, in true Image Factory style. The same eyes as the artists of Aestheticism, with their search for art “for art’s sake”. For us too, as for the aesthetes, realism (reportage) is a “pathway of thorns” within the search for the Beautiful (in photography). While its encounter, the encounter with the Beautiful, occurs while scrambling around within ourselves, paying heed to our own feelings and our own emotions.
It is in this spirit of rebirth, in the search for new life within us, that we wanted to dedicate to Eros the “stories behind the winter images”. As, to cite Plato, whoever is held by Eros becomes a creator, and they like the Roscioli, Bettoja, and the Roman Walks families, who love beautiful things, shall be happy.
Gabriel Rifilato
(caartstudio.roma@gmail.com)
