Anniluce is a profound reflection on the beauty and fragility of nature, a collection of original photographs and poems by Angela Pietribiasi
by Angela Pietribiasi
I have always been interested in the parallels that exist between different things, and in my latest work I focus particularly on those that we can discover in the universe as a whole. Primordial matter is everywhere, from our tiny planet at the edge of the Milky Way to the edge of the solar system and beyond. In my book Anniluce (‘Light Years’) the main characters are ice, snow and rock, and they offer the perfect way to talk about nature and infinity: the beauty of our planet and the infinity of which it is a part. Our moon hides a heart of ice, the planets in the solar system have mountain ranges, rocks are everywhere in the universe, and the water in our oceans was brought to Earth by comets that hit it in the distant past. This is not the first time I have delved into this topic: I wrote about these themes in my previous projects Acqua sulla Luna (‘Water on the Moon’), Fuoco Bianco (‘White Fire’) and Corpo Celeste (‘Celestial Body’).
Anniluce is a book that describes both beauty and loss. The landscapes are depicted in an unspecified time and place in a state of suspense: something has just happened, something else is yet to happen. One might even ask: are we still on Earth?
Our ecosystem is so severely compromised that certain words that once had positive connotations now have a different effect on the public imagination. For example, the word ‘thaw’, which until recently was associated with spring and the concept of rebirth, is now associated with the climate crisis, because we are part of an interconnected system and when one part suffers, the rest suffers too. The distress we are experiencing is so widespread that a specific term has been coined for it: solastalgia.
In these uncertain times, when it is increasingly common to feel homesick for a home we feel we have lost, even though we still live here, the only way we can find solace is to rediscover ourselves in the beauty of nature: ultimately, this is where we can find the answers to stopping the Anthropocene drift. Achieving change will not be easy: there are complicated and tiring stretches ahead, but it is the only way we can one day achieve meaningful results. There are key choices to be made, firstly about the environmental sustainability of business and government industrial strategies, but also about a new individual approach to everyday choices about the way we live and the things we consume.
Angela Pietribiasi, an artist and poet who lives and works in Turin, has been exhibiting in Italy and abroad since the late 1990s. Anniluce is her latest book, published by Seipersei in Siena in October 2023.
In the preface by Antonio Carloni we read:“…We are faced with a project that questions itself about the primordial beauty of the primary elements, about the trapped particles of light that take light-years to reach the Earth after leaving distant stars, about the absolute suspension as a status of humanity on this planet, and about the primordial amazement that comes from experiences that began outside our Earth and have found a perfect home in this world. Just think of the origins of rocks or water, brought to this world by comet stars over billions of years. Turning the pages of the book, you lose yourself in the wonder of nature and its elements, you move in places that live in a permanent state of expectation, the light is set to zero, isolating the subjects to make them eternal and fragile…”.
Nature
I came to meet you
calling you by name
a single name
immeasurable
for all the countless forms
magnificent and fierce
in the sky on the land and in the sea.
I came to meet you
and I asked you
about right and wrong
“better to speak of survival”
you replied fading
into a dust of ash and light.
Above, Iceberg from Spegazzini Glacier.
(Gallery – Anniluce – Barchemagazine.com – April 2024)
