Wealth of the Land: An exhibition of prints by Chips Mackinolty PDF

*** This is an E-Book: a PDF will be emailed to you ***

The wealth of the land is a catalogue marking Chips Mackinolty's sojourn in Palermo, the capital of Sicily, Italy. More accurately, the months he spent living in La Vucciria, a market that dates back to Arab rule 12 hundred years ago. In it, he documents the changing availability of fruit and vegetables across the seasons in which food is always local.

"… I find myselfliving in the Vucciria, the oldest market inthe historic centre of Palermo, the capital of Sicily. A market that goes back to Arabic times, and still bears powerful traces of French and Spanish hegemony. And which still reverences dialect over formal Italian, where cooking is done with àgghia and not aglio—let alone garlic!

Most days I have a couple of beers at the Taverna azzurra, sitting down with Pasquale who runs a tiny fruit and vegetable stand across the discesa di Maccheronai. I’d noticed the obvious: that the fruit and vegetables in the Vucciria, and at the larger Capo and Ballarò markets, were always fresh—but also astonishingly seasonal. A particular kind of bean, for example, would only be available for a couple of weeks, then disappear to return a year later. And some things are just never there, totally unlike the insane “fresh grapes flown in from California” regime available in the rich West."

Translated into Siciliano and Italian, it reminds us that the wealth of the land can be--should be--based on locally grown produce rather than massive international importation with all the threats it poses our environment.

Features 29 fruits/vegetables

Includes an essay by Anita Angel

112 pages
Published in 2016