Arcangelo Sassolino: Elisa

To commemorate the two Mafia attacks in which judges Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino as well as members of their escorts lost their lives, one of Italy’s greatest artists presented his new artwork at the invitation of the Falcone Foundation. “Elisa” is a symbolic sculpture in the shape of an excavator, white and headless, moving on itself through slow and apparently uncontrolled movements. The excavator was in a building site, completely burnt out, blocked due to contracting issues and the mother machine: Arcangelo Sassolino has thus given new life to the mechanical arm by giving it an artificial heart, through a hydraulic system. Thus, in one of the most beautiful and at the same time most fragile historical sites in the city of Palermo, the brutality of the cement, even if it is temporary, and the obtuseness of the demolition machine, which eats everything burst forth with their strident presence.