In Salento, time is never a straight line. It is a skein of stories, landscapes, minor architectures and wise hands that, at times, stretches and unravels. It is in this context that "Intrecci-Intertwinings", a group exhibition of art and design promoted by the City of Salve, Lecce, with the support of the Regional Council of Puglia, was born, co-curated by Valentina Rito with Giacomo Niccolai. An ambitious project, designed not only to exhibit, but to regenerate a forgotten former monastery, the identity of a territory, and the link between people and places.

"Culture regenerates," says Councillor for Culture Patrizia Pizzolante, "Intrecci-Intertwinings is also an exhibition for a place: the former Capuchin Monastery in Salve, which has been closed for some time. With this event we intend to inaugurate a new path, experimenting with cultural and artistic functions that can return this space to the community, making it alive again, usable and generative of relationships."

In the 17th-century former Capuchin Monastery, a building that still preserves original frescoes and passages full of memory, a choral and multi-layered narrative between craftsmanship, installation and design takes shape from Aug. 31 to Sept. 14, 2025. The interweavings evoked by the title are not just metaphor but a factual gesture. Fibers, materials, local references and contemporary trajectories meet in three thematic chapters: Light and Rituality, Threads and Weaves, Matter and Roots.

The selection brings together designers, artists, artisans and studios such as 6:AM, Andrea Vitti, Andrea Zambelli, Benedetta Mori Ubaldini, Cosma Frascina, Daniele Papuli, Duccio Maria Gambi, Marco Guazzini, Mayice Studio with Ábbatte, Milena Paladino, Morghen Studio, Rowan Mersh, Scatter D, Tipstudio with Anna Lucia Rizzello and Vezzini & Chen. A balanced ensemble, in which each intervention starts from the material gesture just mentioned to return - with different interpretative grammars - an idea of belonging, care and transformation. Dedication, I might add.

Patrizia Pizzolante, Councillor for Culture

The common thread, as the title suggests, is the interweaving:, here specifically, of materials and knowledge. This is literally found in the works of Tipstudio, which presents a woven tapestry with Anna Lucia Rizzello and a mirror made from local earth, or in the layered paper sculptures of Daniele Papuli. There are those who work on light and rituality - such as Mayice Studio and Benedetta Mori Ubaldini - and those who start from textile fibers, from voids and solids, from minimal textures, such as Milena Paladino.

Some choose the olive tree, such as Andrea Vitti, who recovers wood from unhealthy trees in collaboration with local craftsman Rodolfo Rolli; others immerse themselves in the mineral landscape of the territory: Duccio Maria Gambi makes his intervention in residence at Bianco Cave, while Marco Guazzini presents two projects in dialogue with the Salento land. His Stuoia vases are born from a hand-molded mesh covered with Lecce stone dust; the Staurolite coffee table, on the other hand, takes inspiration from the crystalline structure of a mineral: "I wanted to give shape to the hidden harmony of things, as seen through a microscope," he says. 

"Interweaving" works precisely because it does not try to unify voices, but rather makes them coexist. Each project maintains its own autonomy, but embedded in a visual and curatorial ecosystem that enhances it. Most importantly, it steers clear of a certain postcard exoticism that often plagues cultural operations of this kind. Here the landscape is not background, but interlocutor, rough, fertile, layered, like the Lecce stone on which-not surprisingly-many have decided to work. And with good reason.

It is not just about valorizing or recovering, words that are inflated today. The deeper attempt of this exhibition is to activate a process of collective reappropriation of spaces, of dialogue between contemporary design and local memories, of attention to what often escapes the gaze - an embroidery, a cleft, a knot. And if regenerating also means rewriting, "Intrecci-Intertwinings" is, first and foremost, a way of putting the pieces back together. Unhurriedly, methodically, and poetically.Excellent choral work by the artists all and the curators.

Opening image: Photo Alba Deangelis