We went to Nazzano on March 13 to deliver one of my works, Persistenza, to the Museo del Fiume, where it was to be exhibited at the opening of IGREEN alongside sixteen other contemporary artists.
The exhibition explored the meaning of “green” in our current time. Understood as sustainability, but also examined through the ambiguity of the communication we are constantly immersed in, which often empties this concept of meaning and renders it hazy, unclear.
After delivering the work, we decided to take a walk through the village. It appeared beautiful in its stillness. At that hour it was completely deserted, and many of the houses we saw were uninhabited, left to decay. When we reached the top of the town, overlooking the Tiber in all its beauty, we even leaned into a nearly collapsing apartment. The rooms were connected by small flights of steps and built at different levels.
Some descended into what felt like dark, damp cellars, while others opened onto nothingness. Some were windowless and filled with objects scattered across the floor—tuff dust, stones, what looked like clothes, blankets, household items. I couldn’t bring myself to take any photographs inside. It felt as though I would be violating the intimacy of those who once lived there, or perhaps of those who might still take refuge there, having no other choice.
Silence reigned everywhere. The only sounds were cries and chirping birds of every kind, the wind, and a distant noise I couldn’t quite identify at first. I thought it might be a helicopter or a plane, but it was softer, more fluid, more enveloping. Then I realized — it was the river.
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