Hotel

Pencil, fabric, polymer clay, prints, photographs, wood, 170 x 200 x 20 cm, 2018

On the sides of the cathedral of San Nicolò a Noto in Sicily, two squares house semicircles of Ficus which in turn are places of nightly refuge for flocks of passerines looking for a warm shelter. Why doesn’t this take place not in the open countryside but instead among the dangers and threats of human habitation? Because the temperature in the city is warmer by a few degrees.
My research has started from this case of noisy synanthropy (the chirping in the late afternoon in the square is very loud) to open itself to other examples of flora and fauna that involve the Val di Noto and especially the nature reserve, also a partly anthropomorphised environment as it once housed the salt pans useful to the Tonnara very close by.
The topic of synanthropy raises several urgent discussions that include problems related to climate change.
The installation was carried out during the residence fully_grounding 2018, curated by Bridge Art and is now part of the collection Tenuta La Favola.
The research was helped by Renzo Ientile, ornithologist and researcher at the University of Catania, Filadelfo Brogna, manager of the Azienda Regionale Foreste Demaniali and director of Riserva Orientata di Vendicari and Fabio Malone, botanist.