The song of the new emigrants, 1984

This series, set in Calabria between 1984-85, draws inspiration from Franco Costabile’s poem Il canto dei nuovi emigranti (The Song of the New Emigrants), a lament for those forced to leave their homeland. Giacomelli visited towns such as Cutro, Badolato, Pentedattilo, and Caraffa di Catanzaro, and was deeply moved by what he encountered.

“I was struck by Pentedattilo—it felt like another country, deserted yet alive. From the road, it seemed abandoned, but I found fresh vegetables planted and flowers at polished graves. It was eerie, this mix of desolation and life. The mountains with their great holes seemed to call out for the people who once lived here. The houses appear to merge with the mountains, their walls crumbling and being swallowed by the land. The light, though from the moon, seems to burn holes into the buildings, filling the photographs with an air of death.”
(Mario Giacomelli, interview with E. Castagna)

This vision of Calabria contrasts sharply with the overpopulated poverty depicted in Giacomelli’s Puglia series (1958) or the picturesque beauty of Scanno (1957-59). In Calabria, guided by Costabile’s poem, Giacomelli portrays a region defined by loss, caught between presence and absence. The abandoned villages, eroded mountains, and suspended lives reflect a haunting, tragic stillness that lingers in the photographs.

(Adapted from Katiuscia Biondi’s text)