The concept
Empathizing with water and following the current backwards, celebrating a ritual, immersing oneself. “Going back to the source” is a narration on the value of regeneration, giving life to a permanent flow capable of transforming what exists without dispersing it, retaining it, like a drop of water set in a grate.
Project and set up
Gaia Gennati | landscape architect
The interview
What is the last book you read? And what will be the next one?
The last one is “Il progetto del paesaggio nel XX secolo” (Landscape design in the 20th century) by Pietro Porcinai, a book that was fundamental for my specialization thesis and that I wanted to read again. The next one will be “The lost garden” by Jorn de Précy.
Your next trip?
I hope this spring I will be able to accompany my students on a study trip to Copenhagen, after the last few years in which it has not been possible. Later I would like finally to discover Sicily.
Favourite colour?
I love the purple-red colour, that of the flowers of some varieties of Sanguisorba for example. Mustard yellow and sage green.
What is the plant that matters most to you?
The Jacaranda mimosifolia tree, which takes me back to the four years I lived in Buenos Aires. In November, the still bare branches are dressed in flowers, tingeing the boulevards and parks of the capital with purple.
Where would you live?
If I think of a place in the world, Buenos Aires again. In Europe in Barcelona, in Italy for sure Genoa.
What is your favourite historical era?
The period at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries. That of the Grand Tour, of training trips, but also of the explorations of the naturalist and geographer Alexander von Humboldte and the botanist Aimé Bonpland.
Can you describe in short a scene that represents “beauty and elegance” for you?
The photo of my paternal grandmother, with a black dress and white fishnet gloves. In the background, in the centre of the Great Lake, the temple of Diana in the park of Villa Durazzo Pallavicini in Genoa Pegli. She is smiling at my grandfather.
What is a garden for you?
It is recollection, pause, dedication.
What is the water landscape for you?
I am thinking of the works of Carlo Scarpa, such as the Brion Tomb, the monument to the Partisan and Querini Stampalia itself. Projects in which water is a poetic constant, silent protagonist, glorified element.