RUC Rural Residency for Contemporary Art
Val Camonica, Italy - 2019 & 2022
RUC is an international artist residency, welcoming artists, musicians and writers from all over the world. RUC is situated on an estate of 8 hectares
(around 20 acres) on the hills, ringed by higher mountains, with a wide meadow and wooded area, a vegetable garden, several fruit trees, and vineyards that produce very refined wines with innovative methods. On this property there are three country houses creating a tiny rural community, and two villas where artists are hosted, the headquarters Villa Amati, and the Casetta, an ancient rural mansion restored with comfort and charm.
RUC supports multicultural dialogue and interdisciplinary exchange between international artists and local traditions in a rural dimension that offers artistic time in solitude and exchanges between peers. Sited in a remote location, RUC’s isolated beauty is the ideal environment for intellectual work and creates optimal conditions for concentration and creativity, international exchange, friendship, and mutual understanding. RUC believes that experiencing the ancestral magic of rural life in the Alps may enhance inspiration and support creativity through reconnecting artists to the natural world and to their genuine self.
In this context, experiencing the UNESCO site of Valcamonica Rock Engravings is a central part of the experience for artists spending time at RUC. This ancient artistic way of expression shows its powerful and ancestral magic through the reflection of its primordial archetypes in the work of contemporary artists. The large concentration of signs suggest the special nature of this area. In fact, this landscape offers a great diversity of intertwined, overlapping forms such as plains, terraces, woods, water, diverse vegetation, and in this context ancient stones create a pictorial Fig. II imagery that already belonged to the prehistoric man.
This ‘pictorial’ environment, is also a communicative one due to the strong dialogue between the mountains and its villages, and among the hermits who lived here. The rock engravings are inserted in this system of imagery and communication, an uncontaminated, pure diary of sensations and needs, whose symbols on the rocks suggest the close relationship between man and environment. RUC is immersed in this complex and serves as a link between various protagonists: visual artists, writers, art historians, archaeologists, friends, landlords, artisans, and peasants who have been living and cultivating the land here over the years. ~ RUC Rural Residency in Contemporary Art
Click here to see my gallery of RUC-inspired paintings
(around 20 acres) on the hills, ringed by higher mountains, with a wide meadow and wooded area, a vegetable garden, several fruit trees, and vineyards that produce very refined wines with innovative methods. On this property there are three country houses creating a tiny rural community, and two villas where artists are hosted, the headquarters Villa Amati, and the Casetta, an ancient rural mansion restored with comfort and charm.
RUC supports multicultural dialogue and interdisciplinary exchange between international artists and local traditions in a rural dimension that offers artistic time in solitude and exchanges between peers. Sited in a remote location, RUC’s isolated beauty is the ideal environment for intellectual work and creates optimal conditions for concentration and creativity, international exchange, friendship, and mutual understanding. RUC believes that experiencing the ancestral magic of rural life in the Alps may enhance inspiration and support creativity through reconnecting artists to the natural world and to their genuine self.
In this context, experiencing the UNESCO site of Valcamonica Rock Engravings is a central part of the experience for artists spending time at RUC. This ancient artistic way of expression shows its powerful and ancestral magic through the reflection of its primordial archetypes in the work of contemporary artists. The large concentration of signs suggest the special nature of this area. In fact, this landscape offers a great diversity of intertwined, overlapping forms such as plains, terraces, woods, water, diverse vegetation, and in this context ancient stones create a pictorial Fig. II imagery that already belonged to the prehistoric man.
This ‘pictorial’ environment, is also a communicative one due to the strong dialogue between the mountains and its villages, and among the hermits who lived here. The rock engravings are inserted in this system of imagery and communication, an uncontaminated, pure diary of sensations and needs, whose symbols on the rocks suggest the close relationship between man and environment. RUC is immersed in this complex and serves as a link between various protagonists: visual artists, writers, art historians, archaeologists, friends, landlords, artisans, and peasants who have been living and cultivating the land here over the years. ~ RUC Rural Residency in Contemporary Art
Click here to see my gallery of RUC-inspired paintings
Photographs from my experiences at RUC
2022
2019
