Villa Unda

Villa Unda

In collaboration with associations and Onna inhabitants Artist’s book 2011

Villa Unda is a booklet made of notes, drawings, sketches, documents that have been dictated by the inhabitants of Onna, a small town close to L’Aquila, stuck by the earthquake in 2009. In the research I have carried out in Onna, I have asked the inhabitants to show me skills and abilities they exercise in their everyday life, as well as their pastimes, traditions, and habits. My main objective has been, on the one hand, to try to understand what has changed after the earthquake, with particular reference to the new spatial configuration; on the other hand, to transform these daily habits in strategies necessary to become conscious of the new spatial organization that surrounds them. I have decided to give voice to the needs of the inhabitants of Onna, emphasising their thoughts and their physical work, their use of space. I wanted to give voice to their abilities, which were not specialist, but, in my opinion, fundamental for our society, as far as they are part of a collective memory, realizing a booklet that contains different points of view on how you can interpret and live a “new” space after an earthquake. Flipping through the pages you will find the voice of the inhabitants denouncing the actual situation and tracing, through their stories and memories, a change, which is not only spatial, but also social and cultural.