Un-Real Estate

Spiralbound book, 16×24 cm, laser print, 10 copies.

After World War II, Italy was not doing very well. But among the undeniable difficulties there was a great desire to get up, to expand, and to go on holidays. In the Fifties, a group of young entrepreneurs decided to bet their hopes on the strip of golden sand known as Bibione. In the Capitalism boom that followed the war, they began building what was to become Italy’s second most popular seaside resort.

Returning to the seaside after a few years of absence, and after the first months of a global pandemic, the most striking presences there were the exoskeletons of the holydays of thousands of tourists who did not show up. All of a sudden, those buildings became unreal presences in the middle of the maritime pines and just a few miles from the shoreline. Placid and sad ghosts, eager for noise and chatter but also relieved to be able to extend their winter rest for a while longer. Without any soul to run the show, that small piece of coastline that has always been the core of my summers showed, for a brief moment, its intrinsic essence of a large empty circus.

2020—2021