Emanuela GiaccoIn un battito d’ali

An installation that pays tribute to L’Aquila’s resilience and rebirth, created for the 15th anniversary of the earthquake

Two large butterfly wings – as grey as stone and as blue as freedom – woven with nautical rope knots and suspended, ready to take flight, as a symbol of the soul, of transformation, hope, beauty and, at the same time, the flimsiness of happiness. The butterfly brings a positive message of resilience and rebirth; it flies after overcoming the isolation and constriction experienced as an individual touched by a physical or emotional earthquake, a lonely being, who leaves its first existence in the dark and gets ready to face the future. The thread that generated the cocoon becomes the material of the new wings bearing witness to the ties, knots and tangles of each one in relation to the other: a representation of the “I” that connects to the “Whole”; a spark of energy that is part of a larger design.

Emanuela Giacco

After her studies in engineering, she had two crucial encounters: one with Prof. Picozza, President of the Giorgio and Isa De Chirico Foundation, with whom she organised her first solo exhibition, and one with Marina Mattei, curator of archaeology at the Capitoline Museums. She thus began to participate in exhibitions, opening herself up to debate with artists, critics and collectors, in dialogue with the national and international art scene. She has exhibited in Bruges, Barcelona, Corte Franca, Florence, Genoa, La Spezia, L’Aquila, Mantua, Milan, Olbia, Palermo, Paris, Poltu Quatu, Porto Rotondo, Rome, San Pantaleo, Turin, Vasto and Venice. In 2019, she moved back to Abruzzo to enter the studio of Master R. Tiberio, getting closer to sculpture. In 2020, right before the pandemic, she moved to Sardinia, a land full of energy that led her to a further metamorphosis, moving from pictorial research alone to the experimentation of textile sculptures made of recycled nautical ropes.

In un battito d’ali, 2024
Courtesy Emanuela Giacco

with the contribution and sponsorship of the City of L’Aquila