CHRYSTIE SHERMAN
Palazzo Mannajuolo. Via Gaetano Filangieri 37, Naples, Italy
My photograph in the exhibition, Picturing Space, is somewhat of an anomaly. I was
on assignment this summer in southern Italy photographing Jewish sites, and my guide in
Naples took me to see this amazing staircase, a jewel of Neapolitan architecture, as
the Palazzo Mannajuolo, was on the way to the old Jewish neighborhood.
Palazzo Mannajuolo was built between 1909 and 1911, and designed by the architect
Giulio Ulisse Arata, with the collaboration of engineers Giuseppe Mannajuolo
(owner of the property) and Gioacchino Luigi Mellucci. It is characteristic of the
architecture style of the first 20-30 years of the 20th century. This movement, called
in Italy “Floreale”, was happening at the same time as the Art Nouveau movement in
France. The internal ellipsoidal staircase, that winds from the ground floor, seeming
up to the sky, is constructed in marble and wrought iron, and reflects the neo-baroque
Neapolitan architecture 17th and 18th centuries.
My photograph in the exhibition, Picturing Space, is somewhat of an anomaly. I was
on assignment this summer in southern Italy photographing Jewish sites, and my guide in
Naples took me to see this amazing staircase, a jewel of Neapolitan architecture, as
the Palazzo Mannajuolo, was on the way to the old Jewish neighborhood.
Palazzo Mannajuolo was built between 1909 and 1911, and designed by the architect
Giulio Ulisse Arata, with the collaboration of engineers Giuseppe Mannajuolo
(owner of the property) and Gioacchino Luigi Mellucci. It is characteristic of the
architecture style of the first 20-30 years of the 20th century. This movement, called
in Italy “Floreale”, was happening at the same time as the Art Nouveau movement in
France. The internal ellipsoidal staircase, that winds from the ground floor, seeming
up to the sky, is constructed in marble and wrought iron, and reflects the neo-baroque
Neapolitan architecture 17th and 18th centuries.
