Come spirto in un'ampolla
by Enzo Castellucci
portfolio shortlisted call 'Urbanautica Institute Awards 2023', 2023
Category: People and Communities
“Come spirto in un’ampolla” is Alessandro, a businessman who decided to take distances
from society for a solitary life inside the ancient ruins of Guardea Vecchia (Umbria, Italy),
that he had bought in the late 2000.
The financial disaster, due to bad investments and legal fights, did not allow him to realize
his dream: rebuilding the ruins as a wellness and cultural center, now his confinement;
where his resilience has no value except in the realization of his “artwork”.
Between “superhuman silence and very deep stillness”, as he likes to say, and constantly
poised between dream and reality, Alessandro lives in a suspended state of incompleteness,
in fear of old age and death and in the pain of going through these life stages alone.
In the morning of our first meeting, which took place along the Cammino dei Borghi Silenti,
I portrayed Alessandro several times from different points of view and realized that there,
waiting to be caught by the lens, it was me or some part of me.
What happened after this meeting is due to this feeling that involves me. I look at him who
looks back at me and sometimes I feel myself within those confines.
also from Urbanautica Institute Awards 2023