Abbraccio Mortale
by Paolo Michelotti
portfolio special mention call 'Urbanautica Institute Awards 2023', 2023
Category: Nature, Environment and Perspectives
The American courgette (Sicyos angulatus L.) not only forms a very beautiful coat to look at but develops by attaching itself to the trunk of trees of all species, suffocating them with its shoots and preventing sunlight from carrying out chlorophyll synthesis, killing them. At the end of the season, all that remains of the attacked tree is a trunk with bare branches of leaves: a plant that died from suffocation. According to experts, the invasion of American courgettes along the Po River (Italy) is taking on "apocalyptic dimensions." Imported courgettes submerge kilometers of banks and hectares of floodplains. Hundreds of trees have already died from suffocation.
also from Urbanautica Institute Awards 2023