Dawit L. Petros: Prospetto a Mare

Chicago, Illinois—The Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College Chicago (MoCP) is pleased to present Dawit L. Petros: Prospetto a Mare, an exhibition featuring the innovative work of Eritrea-born Canadian artist Dawit L. Petros. The exhibition will run from August 30 - December 20, 2024, and showcases Petros’s exploration of the impact of Italian colonialism in Africa on the people, geographies, and built environments of Africa, Europe, and North America.  

Using Chicago’s Balbo Monument and Balbo Avenue as starting points, Petros explores the legacy of Italian fascism on the visual landscape of Chicago. Both the monument and the street pay homage to fascist aviator Italo Balbo, who directed a squadron of seaplanes that flew from Italy to Chicago during the 1933–34 Chicago World’s Fair. The monument is an ancient Roman column gifted to the city by dictator Benito Mussolini that promotes fascism and still stands just east of Soldier Field.  

Petros’s practice spans photography, video, and sculpture, often incorporating found objects and archival materials. Probing photography’s role in the colonization of the Horn of Africa and Libya, Petros’s artworks are characterized by a layering of complex histories and a poetic sensitivity to the stories embedded within landscapes and communities. Prospetto a Mare encourages viewers to question fixed historical narratives and to reflect on themes of migration, memory, and the fluidity of both cultural boundaries and personal identity.  

“We are thrilled to host the first museum exhibition in Chicago by Dawit L. Petros at MoCP,” says Karen Irvine, Chief Curator and Deputy Director. “By incisively deconstructing established narratives of culture, migration, and power, Petros’s works remind us that the tendrils of the past reach into the present.”  

Dawit L. Petros: Prospetto a Mare is accompanied by a catalog published by Mousse Publishing in Milan, Italy, featuring essays by Lindsay Caplan, Teresa Fiore, Karen Irvine, Ruth Iyob, Cristina Lombardi-Diop, Onur Öztürk, and Dawit L. Petros, to be released in October 2024.   

Dawit L. Petros: Prospetto a Mare opens to the public on August 30, 2024, at the Museum of Contemporary Photography, located at Columbia College Chicago. The exhibition will be on view through December 20, 2024. For more information, visit mocp.org.  

Dawit Petros: Prospetto a Mare is funded by the Terra Foundation for American Art part of Art Design Chicago with additional support from the The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts. The publication Prospetto a Mare (Mousse Publishing, Italy) is supported in part by the Art Gallery of Guelph. 

MoCP is supported by Columbia College Chicago, MoCP Advisory Board, the Museum Council, individuals, and private and corporate foundations. The 2024–2025 exhibition season is sponsored in part by the Comer Family Foundation, Efroymson Family Fund, Henry Nias Foundation, Phillip and Edith Leonian Foundation, and Pritzker Traubert Foundation. This project is partially supported by a CityArts grant from the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events. MoCP acknowledges support from the Illinois Arts Council.

About MoCP
Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College Chicago (MoCP) is the world’s premier college art museum dedicated to photography. As an international hub, MoCP generates ideas and provokes dialogue among students, artists and diverse communities through groundbreaking exhibitions and programming. Museum of Contemporary Photography cultivates a deeper understanding of the artistic, cultural and political roles of photography in our world today.