The project The Cut, the Graft, the Castle, by the artists Mangano & van Rooy, is the
winning entry in the Commissions category of the PAC competition: the 2020 Plan
for Contemporary Art, promoted by the Ministry of Culture’s Directorate-General for
Contemporary Creativity curated by Valentina Bruschi.

The research of the artists Mangano & van Rooy in Castelbuono has focused on engaging with collectivity, community and the natural environment, through which they implicitly confront social and ecological themes. Technical factors aside, the medium of ceramics imbues the artists’ method with a ritual and mythic character. The objective of transforming and reforming matter lends an alchemical quality to their process, not least in terms of spiritual discipline.

In the Sala di San Giorgio the artists created an environmental installation that gives the title to the exhibition with ceramic sculptures, a wall-painting and a sculptural element with wooden trunks that was activated by the artists in a continuous performance entitled, "Tree Human", the opening day and Wednesday, August 24.

In the Ex- Scuderie, the artists also present a group of 10 copper-engraved plates entitled, "Testi innesti": poetic matrices that become rebuses, where different thoughts and languages are grafted (English and Sicilian), distant from each other but united in a dialogue at times surreal, used for the video projected on the facade of the Castle during the concerts of the Ypsigrock Festival.


The results of the project are on exhibition until 31 October 2022.