Massao Mascaro made the photographs gathered in Sub Sole between 2017 and 2020, across a Mediterranean treated at once as geography and as inherited story. The sequence follows the mythological itinerary of Ulysses through Ceuta, Naples, Athens, Palermo, Istanbul, Tunis and Lampedusa, and the people who appear are the young inhabitants and travellers of those places. Over seven voyages and numerous chance encounters, Mascaro goes in search of those who inhabit and traverse this region, which is marked by migrations, exile and displacement.

The publisher describes the literary narratives the artist drew upon as like invisible companions of the photographs, imbuing contemporary images with an ancient substance. Beneath the harsh, hot Mediterranean light, political, economic, existential and poetic implications intersect. Sonia Voss writes that the Mediterranean is a crossroads of cultures and a cradle of foundation myths.

The formal register is restrained. Mascaro works with soft focus, tight cropping and shallow depth of field, so that nearness and touch matter as much as documentary description. His practice sits between autobiography, topography and politics, rooted in how humans relate to the cultural and geographical spaces they inhabit. Eighty-one duotone photographs carry the sequence.

Sub Sole appeared from Chose Commune in September 2021 as a first edition, designed by Bureau Kayser, with text by Federico Clavarino and editorial direction by Cécile Poimboeuf-Koizumi. It is a section-sewn silkscreened hardcover, 24.6 by 29 centimetres, 168 pages, with text in English, French and Italian. The book treats migration and myth without letting either term simplify the other.