The Perfect Union
Every year in the coldest weeks of the winter season, strange sculptures begin to appear in the fields all over the island. It is the moment for grafting.
Wild olive trees grow throughout the island and they produce perfectly tiny olives with a thin and bitter skin. However, though the oil from wild olives is supposedly superior to that of domesticated varieties, the yield is much, much lower. And so the grafting game begins. Wild olive trees grow throughout the island and they produce perfectly tiny olives with a thin and bitter skin. However, though the oil from wild olives is supposedly superior to that of domesticated varieties, the yield is much, much lower. And so the grafting game begins.
ph. Federico Villa
Roberto Sironi
Roberto Sironi brings to his work a tight intellectual rigor most often focused on history and anthropology, as well as a natural instinct for materials and contrasts. He tends to develop healthy obsessions with the methods and transformations of ancient peoples: their architecture, their reasoning, their commerce. His initial serious facade belies a lightheartedness and general empathy. All of this made him a perfect candidate for the reinterpretation of Sardinian weaving - a craft long influenced by the application of artistic and graphic design. Rather than delivering a simple drawing to the artisans, he delved into the techniques and materials, creating his final tapestries in steps of investigation.
What was your strongest impression of Sardinia?
What fascinated me most about Sardinia were the natural elements: the Mediterranean flora - so wild and uncontaminated, the darkness of the night in the countryside, the sounds of the flocks of sheep. The archaeological remains immersed in the woods are now almost incorporated into nature and, as such, become an intrinsic and indissoluble part of the territory.
