TITLE_NAME :
04/30/2026 - 06/14/2026
Fotografia Europea
Cloisters of San Pietro
via Emilia San Pietro, 44/c
Reggio Emilia
The protagonist of Le Jardin d'Hannibal is the Lautaret Garden, the highest alpine botanical garden in Europe, located at 2,100 meters above sea level, beneath the Meije glaciers. It is home to over 2,000 plant species and preserves specimens of alpine flora from the world's great mountain ranges. Since the spring of 2019, I have spent long periods in the Mirande chalet-laboratory, together with ecologists, botanists, and gardeners. As the snows gradually melted, alpine plants from around the world slowly re-emerged from the meadows and rocks. Among the stories shared during our evenings together was that of Hannibal, who is said to have crossed the Lautaret Pass with his motley army, crossing the Alps. From the fusion of these ancient visions and the images captured in the garden, a dreamlike, nocturnal herbarium is born, in which plants re-emerge from winter like the traces of an impossible journey. In its current battle against climate change, this botanical laboratory evokes Hannibal's resistance to Rome. For over two hundred years, scientists have studied biodiversity here, maintaining a global seed exchange network entrusted with the preservation of living memory. Today, the garden is a research center on global change. One of the experiments involves helicoptering and transplanting alpine grass to lower altitudes to study the effects of rising temperatures. Through large-format photographs and colorful monochromes inspired by Karl Blossfeldt, Anna Atkins, and early landscape photography, I explore fragments of life and imagine a primitive world in transformation.
Fotografia Europea
Cloisters of San Pietro
via Emilia San Pietro, 44/c
Reggio Emilia
The protagonist of Le Jardin d'Hannibal is the Lautaret Garden, the highest alpine botanical garden in Europe, located at 2,100 meters above sea level, beneath the Meije glaciers. It is home to over 2,000 plant species and preserves specimens of alpine flora from the world's great mountain ranges. Since the spring of 2019, I have spent long periods in the Mirande chalet-laboratory, together with ecologists, botanists, and gardeners. As the snows gradually melted, alpine plants from around the world slowly re-emerged from the meadows and rocks. Among the stories shared during our evenings together was that of Hannibal, who is said to have crossed the Lautaret Pass with his motley army, crossing the Alps. From the fusion of these ancient visions and the images captured in the garden, a dreamlike, nocturnal herbarium is born, in which plants re-emerge from winter like the traces of an impossible journey. In its current battle against climate change, this botanical laboratory evokes Hannibal's resistance to Rome. For over two hundred years, scientists have studied biodiversity here, maintaining a global seed exchange network entrusted with the preservation of living memory. Today, the garden is a research center on global change. One of the experiments involves helicoptering and transplanting alpine grass to lower altitudes to study the effects of rising temperatures. Through large-format photographs and colorful monochromes inspired by Karl Blossfeldt, Anna Atkins, and early landscape photography, I explore fragments of life and imagine a primitive world in transformation.