I started from the earth the pirriaturi dug to bring the stone to light. I arrived at the planet, which today is kept in the cavities that give rise to the hypogeum gardens. Past and present real mingle with facts, legends, possible truths, and distant mythologies in this place.- Alessandra Calò
Particular global geographies exist as a nexus between the primeval world and the world we are accustomed to. These are mainly natural places that present as thin geographies or thin spaces. They are a conduit between geology, spirituality, and a sense of origin. Often, they are found away from the density of cities and are revered for their ability to transform the rancor of daily modern life into something meditative.
I can think of a handful of thin spaces and imagine more. Some are contained to small sites, shrunk to accommodate the incessant sprawl of human geography. Visiting Sicily in 2016, I came across a site like this in the southern clime of the island. The month was February, early February to be precise, and though warm, the island had not yet awakened from the winter months. I traveled to Ispica on a guess to see the many caves and cave dwellings that permeate the area, creating a porous natural landscape where the natural world meets the human habitation of a millennium previously. Something is empty and haunting about the limestone caves in Ispica, buried under bramble and presenting as otherworldly, their floors covered in sand, their walls in indiscriminate scratchings, calls, and missives from the past. One cannot help but feel something obliquely generational, like an echo reverberating in a hollow honey-drenched skull.
Favignana, an island off Trapani, a port I have visited, presents similar qualities. Though I have not visited the island itself, thanks to the present, I can navigate its Hypogeum garden, its disused and labyrinthian narrows. I am guided by pixel and drone position. This question simulates the antithesis of what I would expect to understand about the location itself in person, which, despite this, yields other permissive questions about how these spaces are now brokered into consciousness. The word Hypogeum itself reminds me of other significant thin spaces. One is the Saflieni Hypogeum in Malta, a reverent space where sound and echo are also a topic of profound mystical potential. So many purposes have vanished along the way in the consultation of human progress. We are left with a patchwork summary of intention and varying realities.
Ctonio, by Alessandra Calò, published by Studiofaganel, designed by Andrea Occhipinti, concept by Andrea, Alessandra, and Sarah Occhipinti explores the dynamic mechanisms of Favignana’s natural limestone quarry turned garden and presents an eroded paradox in which human portraits fossilize, and become dust that replicates the natural world of the island. There is a haunting, specter-like quality to work. Everything is in a state of dematerialization, similar to the work of Jungjin Lee, where vistas are transformed by grain and a lack of clear resolve. In Ctonio, the abyss, or depths of the earth, according to Greek mythology, is delivered in a fervent display of fleeting, ephemeral imagery.
With tip-ins and writing minimally gracing the pages, the book feels more like a book that dissipates while turning the pages, as if a strong wind could erase the whole of it as you try to read along. The strength of the work is its constraint, as a book of more images would lead to repetition without outcome. In this volume, the restraint gives it the impression of an artist book more than a trade copy. I had a similar experience with TR Ericsson’s recent book Nicotine. I had likened that experience to something of an early twentieth-century art periodical like The Studio, with its tip-ins and pictorial emphasis. In this case, I also reference Ruth Lauer Manenti’s granular book, I Imagined It Empty, published last year by Editorial RM. In the case of Ctonio and that book, there is a shared timeless quality to the work that puts it more between the 19th and 20th centuries.
In Calò’s case, this is a direct result of using what appears to be vernacular images in her cast of characters. Some photos, even through the veil of smoke and dissolve, remind me of re-purposed studio portraits. One image reminds me of the work of Wilhelm von Gloeden or, more likely, Guglielmo Plüschow, whose predilections were slightly less problematic (only slightly) than his cousin’s. There is frontal quality to Plüschow photographs that is not exactly lacking in Von Gloeden, but the latter’s proliferation of satyrs overshadows the direct gaze found in Plüschow. I am reminded of the gaze/stare found in one particular image of Calò. However, most of her other portraits rely heavily on disembodiment and obfuscation, which characteristically adds ghostliness to the reading of the work.
Much can be shared here in that summation of Calò’s work. The effect is a perfect collaboration between the artist, editor, and designer. The book object feels precious and journal-like, and other references to work are happening right now from Jungjin Lee, Paul Cupido, Elizabeth Alderliesten, Margaret Lansink, and others who are using the employ of dissolve to stimulate conversations surrounding ephemeral portraiture. Historically, artists like Edmund Teske and Mario Giacomelli covered similar ground. This response to the world and its humans is not new, but how it is constructed in the iteration of the photobook counts. In the case of Ctonio, it is entirely permitted and inherently well-thought-through from start to finish.
Photography: Alessandra Calò
Text: Marilena Renda
Concept: Alessandra Calò, Marco Faganel, Sara Occhipinti
Editing: Sara Occhipinti
Design: Andrea Occhipinti
Publisher: studiofaganel, 2024
Size: 21.5 x 28.5 cm
Pages: 56
Printing: Poligrafiche San Marco, Cormons
Papers: Satogami Indigo Blue 116 g, Fedrigoni Woodstock Camoscio 170 g, Fedrigoni Arena Extra White Smooth 70 g
Print run: 300 numbered and signed trade editions
ISBN: 978–88-946628-9-4