1801 Passaggi - National Documentary Photography Competition

A 1957 archive turned into a national competition

In the first half of 1957, the young Frank Cancian, a self-taught photographer and budding anthropologist, arrived in Lacedonia, a village in Alta Irpinia in the province of Avellino. Over a few months, he captured 1801 photographs while participating in the daily life of the local farming community. From that body of work, rediscovered many years later and returned to the town, the MAVI - Irpinian Visual Anthropological Museum was born, along with the documentary photography competition that carries its legacy in its title: «1801 Passaggi».

This is not just another photography prize; it is the continuation, generation after generation, of an anthropological gaze cast upon a town in the Campanian hinterland that might have seemed peripheral in the 1950s, but which today, thanks to those images, has become a case study known far beyond Campania.

What the call for entries requires

Starting with the 6th edition, the competition made a clear choice: entries are no longer individual shots, but complete photographic projects. The focus thus shifts from the isolated frame to the long-form narrative, consistent with the museum's vocation, which views photography as a tool for social and anthropological inquiry rather than an aesthetic exercise.

The recurring theme is "An Italian town": participants are asked to engage with the selection of photographs Cancian took in Lacedonia and to document communities, people, and places in peripheral and inland areas, capturing both what remains and what changes. The competition is open to professional photographers, amateurs, and researchers, and in recent editions, it has attracted authors from diverse backgrounds, including foreigners residing in Italy.

The jury, awards, and final exhibition

• a high-profile technical jury selects the finalist works—historically twenty—destined for the exhibition and the MAVI archive;
• during the closing event, the winning projects are announced and awarded, alongside several jury mentions;
• the «Frank Cancian» Special Prize is awarded annually directly by the family of the photographer, who passed away in November 2020;
• the winning project is produced as a travelling exhibition, hosted by the Castelnuovo Fotografia festival, the new Civic Museum of Luzzara, and MAVI in Lacedonia itself.

In the 6th edition, the jury consisted of art and photography historian Benedetta Cestelli Guidi, professional photographer and lecturer Dario Coletti, and British anthropologist Michael Herzfeld, professor emeritus at Harvard University. Over the years, juries have included names such as Francesco Zizola, Francesco Faeta, Lina Pallotta, and Mario Boccia: a level of prestige that speaks volumes about the ambition of this initiative born in a town of just a few thousand inhabitants.

A network between Irpinia, Lazio, and Emilia

The competition is co-promoted by MAVI together with the international festival Castelnuovo Fotografia and the Fondazione Un Paese in Luzzara, the Emilian institution linked to the memory of the reportage by Paul Strand and Cesare Zavattini. This alliance is far from accidental: three different places united by the idea that documentary photography is a serious way of understanding Italian towns, rather than a simple album of postcards.

MAVI and the village of Lacedonia

The museum is located at via Tribuni 61, in the historic center of Lacedonia (ZIP 83046), a town in Alta Irpinia overlooking the Ofanto valley, in a border area between Campania, Puglia, and Basilicata. A visit to MAVI and the competition exhibition naturally combines with a walk through the village and the discovery of a territory little touched by mass tourism, characterized by wheat, wind, and expansive landscapes.

The typical calendar

The «1801 Passaggi» cycle spans the entire year: the call for entries is released in the middle of the year, the deadline for submitting projects falls in winter, the announcement of winners takes place in spring, and the exhibition of awarded works is inaugurated at MAVI at the end of December, remaining open for weeks. Admission to the exhibition is free, as is access to the museum during regular opening hours.