Valle Camonica and Valchiavenna are Alpine valleys among the richest in hydroelectric settlements, continuously installed since the early 1900s and a significant part of the industrial, technical, and social epic that, thanks to the energy of 'white coal', modernized the Italian production system.
Cedegolo is one of the places with the most intense hydroelectric identity, with the 1910 SEB and Poglia power plants and the 1950 Edison plant, close and overlooking the Oglio river which collects their turbinated waters, while a little further downstream, dating from 1973, stands the San Fiorano generation and pumping plant. In the immediate surroundings, other power plants and dams strongly characterize the landscape.
In the former SEB power plant, which has become the Valle Camonica Hydroelectric Energy Museum and a hub of musil - 'Eugenio Battisti' Museum of Industry and Labour in Brescia, the exhibition Hydroelectric Architectures in Valle Camonica and Valchiavenna opens on April 8, 2025, presenting 25 photographs by Václav Šedý, a Prague-based photographer known for exhibitions, books, and architectural reportages.
His precise black and white images allow for a discreet entry into the panorama of the power plants, highlighting, through synthesis, their relationship with the landscape and their architectural evolution. From the first to the second post-war period, in fact, their typology and size changed significantly, as the large historicist 'cathedrals' or 'palaces' gave way to small buildings with a simple and sometimes austere appearance. Sedy's photographs allow one to grasp the impact of the different volumes within once natural places and suggest reflections on the evolution of industrial architecture in mountain environments sensitive to transformations.
Comprising specially taken shots, in addition to the buildings in Cedegolo, the section dedicated to Valle Camonica includes photographs of early 20th-century power plants in Temù, Sonico, and Isola. And, by putting the Edison plant in dialogue with a selection of buildings constructed in Valchiavenna in the early 1950s, it allows one to grasp Gio Ponti's clear design lesson.
Included in the activities of the 'all’insù' Architecture Festival 2025, organized by the Mountain Community of Valle Camonica and supported within the third edition of the Architecture Festival promoted by the General Directorate for Contemporary Creativity of the Ministry of Culture, the exhibition will remain open until November 30 according to the Museum's opening hours: Saturday and Sunday from 2:00 PM to 7:00 PM, daily in August.
Václav Šedý was born in the Czech Republic. After studying at FAMU Film and TV Academy, he obtained his doctorate at the Czech Technical University in Prague. In the early eighties, he moved to Italy, where he still lives and works. Formerly a diplomat and director of the Czech Cultural Centre in Milan, he has published in architectural magazines Domus, Abitare, AU, Casabella, ArchAlp, Casa Vogue. He has worked for publishing houses Marsilio, Skira, Electa, Motta, Flammarion, and Phaidon. He has collaborated with the Kunsthistorisches Institut Max-Planck-Institut, the Michelucci Foundation in Florence, the Creval Foundation in Sondrio, the Palladio Museum in Vicenza, and the Gherdëina Museum in South Tyrol. He is the author of numerous images for volumes dedicated to architecture. He currently dedicates himself to Alpine architecture and theoretical studies of the photographic representation of architecture.