May 16 through September 1, 2015 (Monday to Friday from 10am-12noon/2pm-4pm)

BY APPOINTMENT ONLY: email reservations requests at iicwashington@esteri.it

When you email your reservation request, please provide the following: date, time and name of each guest

PLEASE NOTE: the date and time you request may not be available. You will receive a confirmation email. Not open on weekends or holidays.

In Portraits of Milan, Rovatti interprets Milan through a series of portraits of ordinary people depicted in the streets of the city and where food assumes an ironic and playful relationship with each person. The presence of food in the portraits is an opportunity to create new, sometimes paradoxical situations.

The setting is always shared between the two stars, people and food. If it is true that "we are what we eat," food is part of our identity. The foods represented – ones that protect health – were chosen by SmartFood, a research and data project in Nutritional Sciences at the European Institute of Oncology and the Monzino Cardiology Center. SmartFood conducts research on how diet protects health aimed at a new, nutritional approach to prevention. The images, in combination with photographs of Milan's architecture, are concurrently on display at the Malpensa International Airport and at the Expo2015 Casa Corriere Pavilion.

From his studio in Milan, Andrea Rovatti works on photography, communica- tions design, and art installations. His works have been exhibited at the Grand Palais in Paris, the Biennale in Warsaw, the Museum of Arts in Hiroshima, the United Nations Building in New York, the Indian Design Center in Mumbai, the Design Centre in Montreal, the Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie (La Villette) in Paris, the MART in Rovereto, and the Milan Triennale. Lectured in Communications Design for 12 years at the Milan Polytechnic. Selected in 2007 by the Italian Presidency of the Council to participate in the Logo Italy project. Nominated for the XVI Compasso d'Oro and the ADI Index in 2008. Recipient of the 2011 Green Dot Award. Honorable Mention Compasso d'Oro in 2011 and 2014.

A 600 square meters video-installation welcomes visitors at the Expo Milano 2015 - "Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life", which opened its doors on May 1st. The digital wall is composed of 820 videos submitted online from all over the world to Short Food Movie - Feed your Mind, Film your Planet - the global project organized by Fondazione Cinema per Roma and Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia. The Short Food Movie multilingual web platform (www.shortfoodmovie.expo2015.org) collected more than 1000 videos from over 70 countries composing a user-generated collective storytelling about food, nutrition, and life as seen through the eyes of people from all over the world.

The Short Food Movie digital wall at Expo Milano 2015: a collective storytelling about food and nutrition by the world citizens A giant video-installation will welcome visitors at the Expo Milano 2015 - "Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life" (Italy, May 1st – October 31st) which is to open its doors on May 1st.. The digital wall will be composed of 820 videos submitted online from all over the world to Short Food Movie - Feed your Mind, Film your Planet - the global project organized by the Fondazione Cinema per Roma and the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia, chosen to promote the event world-wide – and will be located in the Pavilion Zero, the thematic area of the Universal Exposition tracing the history of humankind via its relationship with food. The immense digital and multicultural exhibit on the Expo core themes "Nutrition-Life" will cover an area of 600 square meters and feature short films uploaded on the Short Food Movie multilingual web platform since June 2014, from more than 60 countries (from Italy to China, from the United States to Australia, from Portugal to Argentina, from Russia to Cuba to the United Arab Emirates), composing a user-generated collective storytelling about food, nutrition, and life as seen through the eyes of people from all over the world and shot using any device (video cameras, smartphones, tablets etc.) and in any video format. Among the uploaded short films which in these months collected more votes online, a jury chaired by filmmaker Ferzan Özpetek selected three winning videos: Back to the Food by Michael Donatone (Italy), Col cibo non si scherza by Francesco Fanuele and Gianluca Santoni (Italy), and My promise by Alfonso Orioste Jr. (Philippines). The jury - which included members Davide Rampello, curator of the Pavilion Zero at Expo Milano 2015, Rossella Citterio, Director of Communication for Expo Milano 2015 S.p.A., Laura Delli Colli, Italian journalist and author, president of the Italian SNGCI (Film Journalists Union), and Diamara Parodi Delfino, Short Food Movie Project Manager - also assigned a Special Mention to Viva la vida by Aurora Cortopassi (Italy) and to An die freude, by the film students of the Beijing Film Academy (China). Finally, MELA by Federica Tantardini (Switzerland) was chosen as the best short film in the contest promoted by Technogym (Official Wellness Partner of Expo Milano 2015) for the category "Food & Wellness". Another contest promoted by the United Nations will award the best video in the "Zero Hunger Challenge" category. The twenty most voted videos uploaded ontowww.shortfoodmovie.expo2015.org by April 30th 2015 will be reviewed by a jury appointed by the UN and chaired by Italian director Costanza Quatriglio (Terramatta, L’isola, Con il fiato sospeso, Triangle), who is currently shooting a short film dedicated to the UN’s theme for Expo Milano 2015: “Zero Hunger Challenge – United for a Sustainable World”. The director of the winning short film will be invited to the Universal Exposition for the celebration of the World Food Day, on October 16th 2015. Finally, the best videos on the theme “Food and Wine” will be screened in the Italian Wine Pavilion at Expo 2015, a journey through history, culture, and autochthonous wine productions, organized by Vinitaly and Mipaaf. All the uploaded videos can be watched online. Photo: http://bit.ly/1Bs6ojV