A visiting day for the artwork and its surrounding landscape
Matteo Raciti’s Oltrecielo invites reflection on landscape as a space of relationship and transformation, where nature, human intervention and technological infrastructure coexist and continually redefine how we perceive the territory.
At Cascina Bauci, in the heart of the Langhe, the site-specific work is inspired by Bauci, one of Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities, whose inhabitants observe the world from above, keeping their distance from the ground. From this imagery comes the artist’s portal, a structure that invites visitors to step into another way of looking at the landscape.
Against the backdrop of the vineyards, transmission antennas rise towards the sky. Instruments of global communication, they coexist with the agricultural landscape and bring out the tensions of the present: between environment and technological development, between the local dimension and global networks, between direct experience of places and communication at a distance.
In this setting the portal becomes a symbolic threshold. It recalls the shape of a stylised cloud, and its circles evoke lenses that isolate portions and details of the landscape. It does not offer a single view, but suggests that every vantage point produces a different interpretation of space. Its natural colours blend with those of the vines, while the long ladder draws the eye upwards and, depending on light and weather, seems to lead towards the clouds or the outline of Monviso. A slight shift of the body is enough to change perspective.
The terracotta birds, hand-modelled by Raciti, add a sensory dimension: they evoke the fauna of the vineyard and a sonic presence often hidden from view. Passing through the portal, the noise of infrastructure gives way to natural sounds, making audible what risks remaining in the background.
Like the inhabitants of Bauci, visitors are invited to step back from the familiar point of view, recognising that a place is not only a physical space but the result of the gazes, experiences and transformations that cross it. Oltrecielo thus presents landscape as a geography in motion, in which natural elements, signs of human intervention and technological networks shape new forms of relating to the world.
Visiting day, Saturday 10 October 2026
Cascina Bauci opens to the public to discover Oltrecielo, learn about Matteo Raciti’s work and observe the surrounding landscape: an opportunity to cross the portal and experience different perspectives on the Langhe.
