MUTE SENTINELS 2024

MUTE SENTINELS 2024

They come out from the darkness when a beam of light shines through the black cypresses or finds its way between the curtains and the shutters of the “Prioria”.
Witnesses of an extraordinary energy which, a century ago, livened up the “ pietre vive “ ( “alive stones” as D’Annunzio called the Vittoriale ) with passion, sex and poetry, now, thanks to that fleeting light, they are brought back to life, always buried in an eternal silence where all is immersed but not forgotten.

AQUA GRANDA 2019

November 12th 2019, the splendid Venice is hit and drown. A mocking stone guest, the so called MOSE, lies on the sea bottom like a defenseless ghost eaten by mussels and rust. In the meanwhile people shovel, prey, dry and swear. Among selfies with plastic boots, bottles, rubbish and floating mattresses, once more, it is the Venetians’ resilience that tries to recover a town from feeling betrayed and humiliated under 187 cm of fear.

CHINESE WHISPERS 2019

On the East Coast of China, in the megalopolis where the future is the past and the past seems to be of no more interest, people are re-elaborating their life style. In fact they are living in a very contradictory state of mind where the illusion of an unrestrained innovation clashes with the “Big Brother” who always watches and registers everything. These pictures come from occasional encounters during which, however, the difficult verbal communication has not been an issue at all. On the contrary, through those looks, often shy and delicate like the Eastern feelings, very well known as being secret, we could establish a kind of empathy and sharing truth. Fleeting moments that are not meant to tell a story or describe something, but just leave a trace, as it should be, light and undefined. Maybe those fleeting moments have something to do with dreams, fears, hope and also disillusions of who are living in such a complex state of mind but I just like to think I have passed on a “Chinese Whisper” I have heard, felt and retold in my own way. Approximate, but real.

RED LAND 2018

Bushes, caves and sinkholes. This is the wild Carso region, that goes from the plateau behind Trieste across the boundaries to the very East of the Italian peninsula.
The project “Red Land ” by Mariagrazia Beruffi won the Lodi Festival of Ethical Photography for the best portfolio of the ITALY PHOTO AWARD 2019.
The Carso region is a harsh land, moved by strong contrasts and frequently hit by a violent wind named Bora. In the collective memory, it recalls both bloody memories and a sense of mystery, maybe because this is a natural place for hiding someone who wants or has to disappear; a transgressive place to practice esoteric rites and clandestine love.
In reality, the people living here are very special and strongly linked to old, simple values, based on the significance of home and the concept of family.  They consist in autochthonous minorities (Slovenians in Italy and Italians in Slovenia and Croatia) whose identity is not linked to a nation, but to a territory. These places are marked by a difficult history, with over a hundred years of disputed boundaries and finally suffered both from those who escaped and those who remained.
Now what once was a border is no more a separation, but a bond that is constantly crossed for many reasons and different lives. For many this still means research for memories of what and where once was a place called home.
Wandering, meeting people and shooting photographs have been the means to enter a complex and rough reality, rooted into an essential agricultural economy, yet sufficient to anchor it to its poor and red land.

LA BODA 2018

Weddings are definitively relevant events among the Spanish families. They represent a sort of “ climax” in each one’s life because during the celebrations all that is normally hidden by the daily routine is revealed and amplified.
A catwalk where the best dress is shown off and a stage of passions and intimate feelings.
Aided by wine flowing, the initial discretion and righteousness turn into display, transgression, ambiguity, erotic allusions and a strong craving for freedom which, undoubtedly, strikes even more in the holy and super Catholic Spain.

BACK 2018

A very special day when Bianca and Aldo, exiles from Istria, decide to go back to the house they had to leave in 1947 when Istria became Yugoslavia. They have been able to forgive the faults of history and meet their land once more. Going back means recovering their memory which does not lie in that bunch of houses on the top of the hill any longer. Everything there is dead and gone. Flashes of memory appear in the air and scents of a magic uncontaminated nature which still surrounds those cracked walls. But those feelings and visions are impossible to pass down. “It is a memory, that of old time Istria, bound to survive, in the soul of those who do not live there just for the fleeting moment of only one generation, the last remained“.
(E.Scalfari)

ANOTHER WORLD 2017

Dream, fear, hard work and endless love. This is my nephew’s world, but also of many others who have a different perception of the reality. It is the so called ”Asperger syndrome”, but I would say it is the most mysterious and uncontaminated state of mind. Thanks to his family’s great effort his life is stimulating and full of love.

CARMINE 2017

It is an old part of Brescia in Italy where prostitutes, pushers, thieves and normal families used to live together. Carmine has always been the place where everybody was adopted , never judged, always accepted. Now, thanks to some university faculties in the area, it has been livened up by students and night life but, at the same time it represents a safe zone for all the immigrants who occupy the remaining crumbling houses.
In those alleys many different stories, can be discovered. Love, loss, solitude, failure but also phantasy and hope for a better future are what people need to share, even for the fleeting moment of some clicks.

THE FLOWERS OF NANJING 2017

In late 1937, over a period of six weeks, Imperial Japanese Army forces brutally murdered hundreds of thousands of people, including both soldiers and civilians, in the Chinese city of Nanjing. Women were raped, children killed as animals, men tortured. A huge fire and the Yangtze river would cancel the traces of the 300.000 victims. Nanjing, then the capital of Nationalist China, was left in ruins, Chinese identity feelings were deeply marked and it would take decades for the city and its citizens to recover from the savage attacks. All the grief and horror of that human tragedy are printed on the faces of Chinese people who visit the Nanjing Memorial Hall now.

PALIO OF SIENA 2016