Giovanni Del Brenna

Born in Genoa in 1974. He grew up in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where he attended French school. He later moved to Milan, Italy, and graduated in Mechanical Engineering from the Politecnico di Milano. Then he decided to follow his first passion: photography.
In 2002 he graduated fromInternational Center of Photography of New York where he attended the Documentary Photography and Photojournalism Program, he joined Grazia Neri Agency the same year and worked as James Nachtwey’s assistant until March 2004.
In June 2006 Hermès Italy commissioned him the photos for the book “L’aria di Firenze”, and in 2011 EDF assigned him to photograph power-plants in Lorraine for the book “En Produisant par la Lorraine”. He has been nominated New Photographer 2007 for advertisement by Getty Images.
His book Ibidem was published in July 2014.

GDB rep

Photo Op represents Giovanni Del Brenna in Italy.

For further informations about the series PARIS AGRICOLE please send an e-mail to info@photoop.it

PARIS AGRICOLE

A series on urban agriculture in Paris. The municipality and the mayor, Anne Hidalgo, have started a campaign to increase the green areas in the French capital. Giovanni Del Brenna has been carrying out a research on urban spaces for years (in 2014 he published Ibidem a book on the urban similarity of the great metropolises of the world) and was very impressed by the Parisian venture, especially attracted by the oxymoron in the concept of “agriculture in the city”.

Del Brenna documented the evolution of the urban environmental project that aims to turn more than 100 hectares into areas intended for agricultural production: from rooftops to abandoned parks, to dismissed industrial sites, from the very center of the city to the suburbs. Many companies have joined the invitation of the City Hall and have made part of their buildings available to associations and cooperatives that take charge of them and follow the farming processes in different seasons. The average age of many of these urban farmers is around thirty years old.

The series features a large number of photographs of the most interesting sites involved in this particular type of urban renewal:

AGRICOOL

AGROPARISTECH

BERGERS URBAINS

BIODIVERSITERRE

BOITE À CHAMPIGNON

DEMONSTRATEUR RATP

HOUBLON AUX GRANDS VOISINS

LA CAVERNE

LA GÉNÉRALE

LA RECYCLERIE

METRO – INFARM