Location: Mediterranean Region
Type: Exhibition Proposal for the SIGNIFICATO Open Call for Cultural Practitioners by Fondazione Studio Rizoma
Medium: immersive installation, translucent fabric, suspended spatial structure, airflow interaction, kinetic textile environment, light and shadow composition, sensory spatial experience
Description: Between Land and Sea is an immersive installation proposal exploring the Mediterranean coastline as a fluid threshold where land and sea continuously transform one another through movement, erosion, and exchange.
Completion: February 2025-March 2025

Between Land and Sea was developed for the SIGNIFICATO Open Call for Cultural Practitioners by Fondazione Studio Rizoma, an international initiative exploring the Mediterranean as a space of cultural, ecological, and territorial transformation.

The proposal investigates the Mediterranean coastline as a living threshold where land and sea exist in a continuous state of dialogue. Rather than understanding the shoreline as a fixed border, the project approaches it as a fluid and ever-changing condition shaped by movement, erosion, exchange, memory, and coexistence. The installation reflects on how natural forces continuously redefine landscapes while simultaneously influencing cultural identities, collective histories, and human relationships with the environment.

At the core of the project lies the idea of the coastline as a transitional space — neither fully land nor fully sea, but an evolving in-between territory. Inspired by geological cross-sections of coastal terrain, the installation unfolds through layers of translucent fabric suspended within a lightweight structural framework. These veils create an immersive spatial composition that evokes both the visible and invisible morphologies of the Mediterranean shore.

The material language of the installation is organized through gradients of color and atmosphere. Earth-toned fabrics reference the sedimented landscapes of the terrestrial environment, while deep blues and shifting transparencies suggest the submerged contours of the sea. Together, the suspended layers form a fragmented yet interconnected landscape that mirrors the dynamic relationship between natural systems and human presence.

Movement becomes a central element within the installation. Controlled air currents animate the fabrics, transforming them into responsive spatial elements that continuously shift and interact. The motion echoes the invisible forces shaping coastal territories — wind, tides, erosion, and sedimentation — while emphasizing the fragile balance between permanence and transformation, stability and uncertainty.

Visitors are invited to move through an open corridor positioned at the center of the installation. This passage functions as a symbolic portal between land and sea, allowing the audience to physically inhabit the threshold condition explored by the project. As visitors navigate through the veils, shifting perspectives emerge through light, shadow, transparency, and motion. Observation transforms into participation, positioning the visitor as part of the constantly evolving landscape.

The installation is conceived as an adaptable environment that changes according to spatial context, airflow, and human interaction. In this way, the work reflects the mutable nature of coastlines themselves — territories that resist fixed definitions and continuously negotiate environmental and cultural pressures. The fabrics reveal and conceal new spatial relationships over time, generating an ever-changing composition that foregrounds the instability and fragility of these liminal spaces.

Beyond its physical form, Between Land and Sea operates as a conceptual landscape that challenges conventional perceptions of borders, environments, and coexistence. The project proposes a vision in which nature and culture are not separate systems, but deeply interconnected realities shaped through constant exchange and mutual influence.

By immersing visitors within this shifting environment, the installation encourages reflection on the Mediterranean shoreline not as an edge or division, but as a place of convergence, adaptation, and collective transformation. It invites new ways of engaging with transitional landscapes at a time when ecological vulnerability and environmental change increasingly redefine relationships between people, territory, and the natural world.

Through its immersive and sensory approach, Between Land and Sea foregrounds movement, interdependence, and the poetic instability of spaces that exist between worlds