Entanglement

Today is heavily overcast, and embroidering in this light is tricky for me—I dislike artificial lighting. So I’m taking the chance to tell you about my new project, something I’m deeply passionate about. It’s my first time experimenting with embroidery on photographic prints, after Food Punk—which I’ll share soon—where I worked instead on letterpress prints.

I met Pasquale Liguori about ten years ago for work. A few years later, I happened to see his photographs, and they struck me deeply. A few months ago, I proposed working on some of his images, introducing him to the world of embroidery on paper and photographs. It’s a practice still known to few — immensely rich, evocative, and full of meaning.

I find this way of working especially powerful for expressing the link between past and present, between physical reality and the life energy that flows through people and the objects around them.
Embroidery, in a sense, animates the photograph, gives it depth, and amplifies its message, making it more immediate.

Pasquale’s series that I chose to work on portrays the Roman borgate, housing built during the Fascist era for the poorest classes and the underclass. It’s both an investigation into Rome’s urban expansion and a reflection on the human weight carried by these structures.

The shots are analog, taken over the years with a large-format camera at 5 a.m. on Sundays. That’s the moment when most people are inside the buildings, and when neutral, collective energy is at its peak—the energy of night rest.

When I first faced these silent images, I wanted to add a new layer. One that could highlight the pulse of human life force defining the objects we use and live among. It’s a kind of quantum entanglement—still little understood—that’s crucial to truly understanding our lives, our responsibilities toward others and the environment, and the way every action and thought influences the whole.

I expect to be working on it for at least another month. Hand embroidery is, by its nature, a slow, meditative art. And while I’m stitching, I think of a hundred other projects I’d like to try. From their rack, unfinished embroideries look at me, waiting for their turn. There’s a million other things I’d love to do. Embroidery is a bit like my spiritual guru — it teaches me patience and order.