About The Collection
Sicilian. Human. Atlas.
Three words that together form a sentence, where each of them has a precise identity. Sicily, a door to enter Europe, to some offering the start of a new life, a point of arrival from neighbouring Africa. For others, the natives, it is a glimpse of the world, its roots running deep. A wonderful land, yet it can be one of the worst. Here nothing is ever as it appears. For contingency, Greek illusion. A work of contrasts: life/death, chaos/silence, resignation/redemption, joy/sadness. Semiabandoned towns where those who leave do not return and middle age is a utopia. The elderly remain, as do the stones of the houses, with doors and windows barred shut and decorated with “For sale” signs. The stones tell of what was and what will be in the near future. We flee Sicily, a land that is dying, and not even slowly. It must be saved in order to not forget, to reproduce on paper what is still there. The paradox is that there is no lack of energy or poetry. In the eternal struggle between leaving and staying, I have chosen to try to stand strong and recount the land I live in, unlike exotic photography that draws us to other places, far away. And yet, opening the doors of the house, opening the metaphorical windows of our lives, that world welcomes us and asks to be described. Life, death, dreams, defeats. Atlas is a journey. No matter how, just where and why. Walking through the geography of the Mediterranean soul, made of sensations, of perceptions that flow from the bare earth after the harvest. Wind, sky, sea currents, sun, moon and salt on the skin. Everything contributes to tracing the signs of the wayfarer’s travels on an imaginary map, who carries nothing but his bones, naked and open to confront surprise, fate, destiny. Human because earthly. Because after all humanity is the focus of the study. His condition of being “modern” in a land that is struggling to evolve and that, when it does, or tries to, gives up a piece of its atavistic identity each time. Sicilian, therefore, means not always being proud. Today, being Sicilian means to set out, to dig deep into the earth knowing that the sea, the only definitive border, has its only limit in the horizon and in the directions of the winds. Three words to describe a borderland. I set off on a journey in search of a small America inspired by Robert Frank and his The Americans. This is the meaning of this work that begged to come out.
