Our third dispatch comes from Carrara, Italy, where sculptor Christina Giuffrida MFA 2018 is learning the ancient art of marble carving
during the ABC Stone Residency.
It was just meant to be a routine tool run to a stone-carving store called Molini in Pietra Santa.
I felt that I had taken to living in Carrara like a fish takes to water. My monk-like life style suited me well, albeit a Chianti- and Aperol-sipping monk. The day begins at 6:30 am, at which time Marina Di Carrara is still waking up and the air is cool, the sky is clear. As I ride my bike to Corsanini studio I find myself staring up at these sheer mountains that rise dramatically out of what is otherwise a fairly flat landscape by the sea. Yet this vista that I peddle towards is different from other environment that I have seen, because these mountains have lifted their earthly veils to reveal their bones. And they are white. Snow white. Every day I see the birthplace of the marble that I am carving, fresh from that formidable mountainside.
Alistair has given myself and Jorge a lift to Molini in invest in yet more chisels. “Look at this, this front yard is full of marble sculptures.” He’s right. The house that we have parked in front of has a lawn covered in impressive marble sculptures. Many of them are old and have begun to grow moss and lichen on them. We then realize that there is not a house on this property, it is in fact its studio and the roller door is slightly ajar. Alistair and I crane our necks over the fence to see if we can get a better look inside, when we meet eyes with an old man. As he shuffles into our sight he stares directly at us through his safety glasses, “Ciao! Come sta?” I call out. Unfortunately this is the extent of my Italian and Alistair and Jorge take over and explain that we are also stone carvers. The old man is delighted and ushers us into his studio. As I step inside I am taken aback by the enormity of the space and the amount of work. And the studio was clearly old, more than 40 years old and the ground was covered in a thick layer of pure white marble dust that had clearly been gathering for all 40 of those past years.
The man’s name is Umberto Antognani and he has been sculpting marble since he was 18. He is now 86. He leads us through a labyrinth of works in progress, workbenches and power tool housed in homemade jugs, to little back room. “Avanti! Avanti!”. The room is filled with the most beautifully finished marble sculptures. From delicate sparrows, with finest of legs to modernist looking voluptuous female nudes. I’m speechless and in awe, I’m also struck with an uneasy sense of deja vu. This whole experience, like much of Italy, is so familiar yet completely foreign. Umberto is watching me and I smile at him, because my smile, my bursting heart filled smile, is all that I have to express my gratitude and appreciation in this moment. He chuckles and smiles back at me, then turns away to retrieve something. Returning with a small object that I can’t quite make out, he asks for my hand and places small plaster relief of an angles face in my palm, and gently pushes my hand back into my chest.
It was in that very moment that I realized why my heart had felt like it was in my mouth, why for the past two weeks I felt I had arrived home to a place that was not my own. I can see my nonno (grandfather), Vito Giuffrida, clear as day. He holds my hand as we walk through his house in Collaroy, back in Australia. His house is filled chaotically with all of his artwork and I love it — it is the ultimate adventure wonderland full of the most incredible things. His paintings, his mosaics, his pots and furniture that he made by hand. My nonno that would sit opposite me at Sunday lunch after Mass and rap his fingers on the table, crawling them towards me and he would chuckle and smile this cheeky smile that he had been smiling since was probably 2 years old.
So I’m in this complete stranger’s studio, I don’t know this man at all, but it’s the closest I’ve felt to my nonno in 20 years. Like he was right there in front of me again, but this time I’m an adult. And I’m an artist like him. And I have come back to Italy to work the famed marble that all of his favorite sculptures were made from. Nonno, I’ve come back and I’m making work. I’m making this work for you.
Christina’s ceramic sculpture maquette used to map out her sculpture in marble