De Finibus Terrae, xylella landscapes
Salento is a region of Apulia in Italy, the last land facing Albania and Greece, is a very ancient land, populated by millions of ancient olive trees. These landscapes characterize the identity of this area, deeply connected to the territory and the population.
In this project the objective is to reveal the radical change that the arrival of “Xylella”, (a phytopathogenic bacterium that affect olive trees ) brought to Salento’s territory. The situation evolved very rapidly into an epidemic, expanding exponentially in olive groves, killing over a period of about 5 years, thousands of olive trees, transforming completely the territory of Salento and canceling the true identity of this land and of the people who live there.
Bruna Rotunno lives in Salento since 2008 and she has assisted this apocalyptic event, seeing her own ancient olive trees die over time. Most of part of her research is related to the relationship with nature and to the representation of the anthropomorphic component.
Fabian Albertini since her childhood, has always been attracted and deeply connected with the trees and nature, very often present in her work. The leitmotif of her work is to reflect on environmental, spiritual and perception issues.
Fabian Albertini and Bruna Rotunno, began their collaboration in 2016 working together into the project “De Finibus Terrae”.
The artists, each with their own narrative and skills, intend to raise awareness and bring to the pubblic opinion a tragedy that threatens to annihilate the culture linked to the olive trees and to involve the entire Mediterranean area.
“We have employed, different types of techniques, that go from analogic to digital photography, Our photographs are testimonies, they are traces of our awareness. Intentionally we introduce our image as a single body of works, where our artistic consciousness crosses and overlaps constantly. Through the abstraction from the real context, we give back life to charred trunks, transforming them into immortal sculptures “.
Photo © Bruna Rotunno – Fabian Albertini
