The economical and environmental impact of the storm that on October 29th 2018 has destroyed the area of 41.000 ha of forest is yet to be analyzed, but even the rough estimations demonstrate that the amount of wood nailed to the ground by the strongest wind this area has ever experienced, is 7 times superior to the material that all italian sawmills could potentially elaborate in 1 year.
So the idea of the scenic project is born out of necessity of creating, by the means of culture and design, of a bridge between the two tragedies that are 2000 years apart, between the two regions separated by 1500 km, between humans and nature.
Description of project by Stefano Boeri
A Dead Forest". A forest of trees killed by a storm, of broken trunks that cover the ground. When I have been asked by Antonio Calbi to imagine a stage project for The Trojan Women of Euripides at the Theater of Siracusa directed by Muriel Mayette – Holz, I thought from the very beginning to portray a Landscape more than a stage scenography. So, walking the stone bleachers of the Theater and looking at the cypresses and maritime pines wood that acts like a natural scenography for the stage, my thought went immediately to the spectalur and terrible image of the thousands of trees shot down by the Carnia wind fury of last october.
Thousands of spruces eradicated and laid down on the ground designing a blurred wake of desolation through the powerful order of the most ancient forests. With Muriel Mayette – Holtz and her team, with the precious assistance of Anastasia Kucherova, we decided to give to those dead plants the last possibility to be present, erect, and still noble within the classical geometry of the Teatro Greco's stage. They are in front of a double public: the one made of human beings on the bleachers and the one made by the trees that make the wood beyond the stage. So, the swarm of the crashed trees, once transported to Siracusa and taken on stage, blended with bodies and the desperate and furious voices of the Trojan Women, has become a dead forest of wooden columns: erect even though sadly decimated. Proud and well ordered, though destined to a new life in sicilian sawmills.
The truth is that today a tragedy that comes from the depths of time is there to remind us the follies of men; and that this tragedy is performed on stage probably in a moment of history when the extremely long times of the evolution of the planet seem to conicide with our daily choices and force us to face our responsibilities towards the natural environment.
The last journey of Carnia crashed forests to the sicilian woods is a symbolic new born bridge between the forest rangers from Friuli and the ones from Sicily. Together with the involvement of the public to create a new forest dedicated to the protagonists of Euripides' tragedy, are a message of hope; or of awareness of our constant ignorance toward a tragedy stegaed for the first time 2500 years ago” Stefano Boeri.
