Lui, Iddu

Lui, Iddu examines constructions of masculinity within the socio-environmental microcosm of a volcanic island, where isolation, labor, and lineage intersect. Developed over four years, the project engages the figure of the fisherman as both lived reality and site of inquiry, tracing how inherited codes of endurance, silence, and emotional restraint persist and adapt within contemporary masculine identities.

Working through a slow, relational photographic approach, the project situates portraiture and imagery in dialogue with the island’s geological and atmospheric conditions. The volcanic landscape operates not merely as backdrop but as an active structure: a terrain marked by containment and pressure, erosion and eruption. These environmental forces parallel the emotional architectures shaping the lives portrayed, revealing how place and inheritance remain deeply entangled.

Positioned between observation and reflection, Lui, Iddu approaches masculinity as a dynamic, transmitted structure rather than a fixed identity. By foregrounding moments of pause, vulnerability, and uncertainty, the work proposes tenderness not as an opposition to strength, but as one of its possible reconfigurations. In doing so, the project reflects on emotional inheritance and transgenerational transmission as processes shaped by repetition, mutation, and interruption. Photography here functions as a space of sustained attention, where the act of looking becomes a means of recognizing inherited patterns - and where awareness itself opens the possibility for understanding and change.

Stromboli, 2020 — 2024