Limbo

We are delighted to award Third Prize to Gloria Mezzadri.

In Limbo, Gloria Mezzadri constructs a nocturnal visual diary shaped by the city of Bologna and the fragile constellation of people who inhabit its margins after dark.

Moving between dim interiors, quiet streets, and fleeting encounters, the work gathers fragments of a life in transition. The photographs trace a personal turning point — a moment when the artist abandoned a previous path and began searching for a different way of inhabiting the world.

As Mezzadri writes, «the images are fragments of an identity in progress — remnants of a journey that began when I decided to abandon my previous life and search for my voice.»

Living in Bologna exposed the artist directly to the realities of instability, precarious housing, and the rhythms of a city navigated largely at night. Yet within this uncertainty emerged new forms of belonging: friendships, temporary homes, shared spaces, and the quiet warmth of encounters that leave lasting marks.

In Limbo, the night becomes both refuge and threshold — a space of intimacy, experimentation, loss, and discovery.