Happiness is Reached, Then You Walk, 1986/92

Giacomelli began Felicità raggiunta, si cammina (Happiness is Reached, Then You Walk) the year his mother passed away, drawing inspiration from Eugenio Montale’s poem of the same name.

Montale’s poem reflects on the fragility of happiness, likening it to a thread that can snap or vanish, leaving disillusionment in its wake. Giacomelli noted how even the structure of the poem is deceptive: the word walking appears in the second line, disrupting the sense of fulfillment in the first. Happiness, fleeting and difficult to sustain, becomes a journey into the uncertainty of tomorrow.
(G. Celant, Mario Giacomelli, Photology-Logos, 2001 / A. Crawford, Mario Giacomelli, Phaidon, 2001)

(Adapted from Katiuscia Biondi’s text)