It feels strange to write about this exhibition at the end of a week that showed us the sea for what it sometimes, brutally and tragically, is: ‘a hungry dog’, as James Reeves once put it. It swallowed up several of our shores, chewed on our coastal rocks, spat out objects that had long been lost, and trapped bodies—oh, worst of all—it snatched those unsuspecting sea-watchers and wouldn’t let them go. It drew them into this restless, relentless, ever-shifting place; uninhabitable, not quite because it is ever moving and ever changing, but because the two main elements so fundamental for life—air and water—are caught up in a raging conflict. The wind blows; the water gushes, it retreats, rises and falls. Irreconcilably, for hours, and days. What holds this world together, what supports life and so much beauty, has the unnegotiable power to take it, and to take it apart.
How strange it is to recall the peace and calm as I drifted from one room to the other, splashed with projections of the sea: corners were converted into horizons of swells and sways; a cave-like space (part of a cistern, really) was transformed into what felt like a semi-submerged periscope through which I could observe the endless motions of the sea, without fear, without the oppressive weight of water, always breathing. And the glints riding on the backs of gentle waves! Brilliant, now, like stars, but unmoving and no longer reflecting that intangible quality of light. The sea and the night meet here, in their vastness and in the way everything seems to take on the same shade, flattened, timeless, and without depth. But I sensed nothing of the fear. Though what a mistake to think any of these would be lacking.
It is deep.
There is history,
There is life.
It is full.
Fear-full.
Cyril, however, does not venture this far. Perhaps, the overwhelming quality of the sea over the past ten years residing on the islands, were for him of a meditative and reflective kind. And indeed, the sea—as with this exhibition—can most certainly offer that. Plenty of it. But the reflections, here, are largely surface-bound, or in any case, not too distant from the shore. It is safe. And pleasant. The kind you’d want to linger on and, if you could, inhabit.
Yet, if it were truly nothing but the sea, that would not be possible. Where will you rest your head? Or your feet? From which well shall you drink? And what of the air that you cannot breathe? The sea can be a hungry dog and without discrimination: it bites at its ‘master’ as it does the stranger.
Giulia Privitelli
