WE ARE HERE [2022]

We Are Here project in Stigliano, celebrating community through food-inspired public artworks.

'We Are Here' is a project by the artist duo Anne Fehres and Luke Conroy which celebrates community and cultural heritage through food, sharing and art. For three weeks the artists lived and worked in the rural Southern Italian town of Stigliano. During this period they invited the community to share their personal recipes and the stories associated with them. These various recipes and stories were captured and are now presented as public artworks around Stigliano.

Each of the artworks has been inspired by a documentary process whereby the local community talked about their personal recipes during the process of creating them. During this process, the artists captured photographs of the creator, the creation process, the food elements and surrounding objects. Later the artists digitally combined the multiple photographs associated with each recipe into a single photomontage composition, bringing together the diverse elements in a surreal and playful way. Each composition has been digitally printed and is presented in the public space of Stigliano at a ‘larger-than-life’ scale.

Each of the installed artworks is celebratory, bringing the recipe and creator from the private space of the home to the public space of the streets. Through this presentation, the local community and a broader audience is encouraged to reflect upon the recipes that hold important cultural value in this place, to find pride in local heritage and connect with each other in new ways.

Video documentation and images of the final works and the stories that go alongside them can be seen below:

Artists Anne Fehres & Luke Conroy collaborate with Stigliano community to create food-inspired art.

Luciano

This is the first of five works presented in the public space of Stigliano, a rural town in Southern Italy. This work is inspired by Luciano and his recipe of Raviolo with stracciatella and tartufo.

Luciano invented this recipe two years ago and it includes all of his favorite ingredients from Stigliano, which he sources himself and from local producers. His secret is to use simple ingredients, a maximum of three per dish. He describes this particular recipe as: simple, tasty, refined.

Luciano makes this dish everyday in his restaurant at the heart of Stigliano. His restaurant is called ‘Trase, ca t’ammudd!’, a phrase in the local dialect which translates to ‘Come in, you’re welcome!’. Always knowing he wanted to be a chef, Luciano started from nothing and opened his restaurant when he was 21. Open now for nearly a decade, you can find Luciano smiling and cooking inside six days a week, supported by his wife Ilenia.

Ilenia and Luciano help feed the small town of Stigliano and early next year will help increase it’s population too, with the couple expecting a baby. In an area of Italy which is suffering from de-population, Ilenia and Luciano are a great example of locals creating opportunities and bringing life to the area.

Culinary-inspired public art in Stigliano celebrates community connections and cultural heritage

Luciano

Local participant Luciano and his wife Ilenia.

This project was created as part of the Euro-Mediterranean co-creation residency program in co-coperation with:

Materia 2019, Open Design School Matera and AppARTEngo