In his essay La luce e il lutto, Gesualdo Bufalino defined insularity as a blend of sacredness, mythological echoes, and theatrical survival. It is, he suggests, a constant coexistence of mourning’s sorrow and the stirring anticipation of imminent rebirth. Sicily remains incomprehensible until one understands that its very essence is intimately bound to the geographical and temporal fabric of its space. It is a land entirely encircled by the sea — a place of arrival, yet also a boundary; an ancestral vessel holding a humanity suspended between the most disparate dichotomies.

In this strange and paradoxical silence tinged with chaos, one often feels lost — on an island steeped in darkness and in a light almost shameless in its brilliance. It is a prelude to death and unrest, yet softened by a surreal warmth: human, mystical, elusive, and yet tangible, embracing.