I have always been interested in human landscapes that are on the verge of being forgotten. I am not talking about things distant in time, but what is still tangible that are close to us that we often pass through with our gaze and physically that we perhaps even use, but that no longer serve their original purpose and no longer interest anyone in their social origin, for which they were built.
There are histories that are crumbling day by day without explosions or executions, without the need to blatantly and systematically tear down building monuments or the history of a great trauma. The most recent of the processes of change in contemporary history is undoubtedly that of the end of the Cold War, which led countries of the communist bloc to change direction in different ways country by country, but with the same constant: that of systematically forgetting the past. It is as if it is somehow easier to let things go than to make strong decisions. These monuments, these statues and places of memory are actually the memory of another generation, the memory of another people as if they belonged to a parallel dimensional plane.
There are histories that are crumbling day by day without explosions or executions, without the need to blatantly and systematically tear down building monuments or the history of a great trauma. The most recent of the processes of change in contemporary history is undoubtedly that of the end of the Cold War, which led countries of the communist bloc to change direction in different ways country by country, but with the same constant: that of systematically forgetting the past. It is as if it is somehow easier to let things go than to make strong decisions. These monuments, these statues and places of memory are actually the memory of another generation, the memory of another people as if they belonged to a parallel dimensional plane.
It is thus that in Vietnam, the statue of Ho Chi Min is still in the centre of his square, but in the opposite corner there is a Prada shop. The flowers on the graves of Vietcong fighters are plastic because nobody goes to bring flowers anymore and the other statues, the propaganda posters, the huge phrases on the walls, are faded backgrounds of a retro film set.
In East Germany, which had to quickly come to terms with a forced and unidirectional reunification, he left the memories of a country and a society in the back of abandoned courtyards. It reused the same palaces of power by whitewashing them and quickly erasing a memory that was annoyingly everywhere at the time and prevented this change. On the monuments in Bulgaria, often on top of the hills, people jog, use them as gymnasiums or take their dogs there; the long stairways become exercise machines, but the decay of disinterest is the common denominator of all these places.
The project is still ongoing
In East Germany, which had to quickly come to terms with a forced and unidirectional reunification, he left the memories of a country and a society in the back of abandoned courtyards. It reused the same palaces of power by whitewashing them and quickly erasing a memory that was annoyingly everywhere at the time and prevented this change. On the monuments in Bulgaria, often on top of the hills, people jog, use them as gymnasiums or take their dogs there; the long stairways become exercise machines, but the decay of disinterest is the common denominator of all these places.
The project is still ongoing
