Essays / Storie

Wrecked Dreams Lampedusa (2009)

Thousands of tourists flock every summer to the island of Lampedusa off the coast of Sicily. They mostly come from the northern part of Europe of from Italy for the beaches, the turquoise waters and the cliffs. But there is more happening in this small chalk plateau in the middle of the Mediterranean. Flocks of [...]

Poggioreale (2009)

Forty years ago. Belice valley Earthquake (Sicily/Italy). 6.3 Richter, 370 deaths, 70.000 evacuees. Poggioreale, Gibellina, Salaparuta, Salemi, Menfi and other towns destroyed or heavily damaged. In some cases entirely rebuilt elsewhere. In the case of Poggioreale, that look still nearly ok from the distance, on his cultivated hill, the feeling, with the images of the [...]

Refinery Again (2008)

Nature is able to adapt. Recently, for instance, great catastrophes, as petrol spills in the sea, did not produce, in some cases, all the predicted effects thanks to the extraordinary resilience of ecological systems. Our planet evolution, even if only in the last century heavy marked by the so called “industrial progress”, always showed an [...]

Oculus Asini (2008)

Oculus Asini (Donkey’s Eye) Donkeys. Ignorants? Clumsy. Not well done horses? Biblical. Accommodating. Irremovable. Enduring? Intimate. With a look that wraps, between open fields and trenches, our being free, and, in the same time, prisoners. 24×17 inches / 60×40 cm Limited edition of 50 Archival Pigment Prints 24×17 inches / 60×40 cm Limited edition of [...]

Eternal Train (2008)

You sit on a dirty window of the train that from Fiumicino crosses Rome, direction Fara Sabina. While the train runs, you capture what you “see”, you freeze what is passing in front of you. And the “Eternal” city deny itself, it becomes a common place where people live, sometimes along the rails, where graffiti [...]

Lifestage (2008)

Lifestage is a metaphor of our life, of our relationship to it. An empty space filled with our presences, sometimes as spectators, sometimes as live actors, together but also alone. Installation by Castellino & Medica

Faith (2008)

Some people have still Faith. An intense, intimate, faith. To demonstrate it, to themselves and to others, in the night of May, 9th, they go as pilgrims, without shoes and nearly naked to the S. Alfio sanctuary. In the church there is a mystical atmosphere, all faces are touched and taut. When they finally reach [...]

Final Cut (2008)

There is a cruel representation of Death, of death already happened but still present. A representation where flesh, in its physical attributes, and the act of dismember it, even if done routinely, is still meaningful. That’s perhaps why blood itself is more linked to life rather then death. Knives, expert fishermen hands, big fishes blood, [...]

Falconara (2008)

This essay has been concieved from the suggestions of Timothy O’Sullivan Tufa Domes, Pyramid Lake, Nevada, 1867, one of the first known photographs. Timothy O’Sullivan Tufa Domes, Pyramid Lake, Nevada, 1867

The Altar (2008)

There is a small, remote altar along Sicily coastline. It is a place where devotion and religiosity mix with women dreams. A place where magical things may happen where images of the past can merge with hopes for the future. Limited Edition of 50 prints 24x17inches, 60x40cm, Archival Pigment Print

Sunday (2006)

Sunday morning. Working tools and things waiting to return in life, frozen, looking for arms, hands and activity. Or, simply, glad to rest for a day, enjoying a deserved inactivity. 40 cm in the shortest side, Archival Pigment Print Limited edition of 15 prints

The Station (2006)

I’ve always been fascinated by stations. When I was a child Sicily had still an autonomous railway system, built at the end of 1800 and used till the Seventies: it was a practical way to fill the distances between small towns, in a period where cars were still not very diffused. This railway does not [...]

Impressions of NYC (2007-2010)

This work is my tribute to New York City. A set of impressions taken during my weeks, in different years, in the Big Apple. Edition of 5 +1 author’s proof / 150×100 cm – 60×40 inches Edition of 10 + 1 author’s proof / 90×60 cm – 36×24 inches Edition of 15 + 1 author’s [...]

Etna Breath (2006-2011)

Living under a Volcano has some clear advantages. One of them is the possibility to hear its breath. Some of the shots on Etna Breath have been previously on Repubblica.it and on National Geographic Magazine.

The Other America (2007)

America is sometimes different from certain stereotypes we, as Europeans, are used to see. Abandoned places, old cars in beautiful natural contests. Out of metropolitan areas America has different color and produces different vibrations. Other colors, other feeling, the Other America. 13 photographs, 100×60 cm, Archival Pigment Prints

Interior Spaces (2007)

Traces (2006-2007)

This exhibition could also be titled “Explor(e)/A(ct)ions” as the pause interposed between the two parts of the word shows the will to distance oneself from the tourist-exotic illustrations which are commonly referred to as “photographs” but, most of all, the pause is meant to underline the active value of the photographic image. The works by [...]

Refinery Flock (2006)

In winter afternoons, thousands of birds, attracted by the warmth of the Refinery, start a dance that last till dusk. They arrive, converge, take the warmth, and fly away. Two magical hours, a time to admire the “strange” relationship between Nature and men: a synergy that, sometimes, is possible. Edition of 5 +1 author’s proof [...]

A Men’s World (2006-2008)

In every seasons, but only in small towns, Sicily squares are populated just by men. Men who shared experiences, lived, in some cases, through two wars, they still use squares as the center of their social life. They’re our grandfathers, our memories. This project is dedicated to them, to their simple and spontaneous gestures, their [...]

Trapani (2006)

A Sicilian Easter. The annual ‘Procession of the Mysteries’ in Trapani, Sicily, is a 400-year-old ritual brought to Sicily by its Spanish colonizers of the 15th century. The procession begins at 3:00 pm on Good Friday and continues for 24 hours. In the procession, townsmen carry one-ton statues depicting the Stations of the Cross. The [...]

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