Europe’s biggest, ongoing environmental disaster as of Sunday February 18 2024.
Dolce vita, where are thou?
NEWS: THE FALL OF HELL HAS BEGUN, CLOSE ALL WINDOWS
NEWS: MILAN IS POOR
It’s October 2022, and the air quality in Milan, which is already poor, is getting worse. It’s red alert, 24/7, day and night.
Winter is coming.
NEWS: MILAN IS POOR
It’s the beginning of September 2022, and the air quality in Milan, which is already poor, is getting worse, read: very poor and extremely poor.
Winter is coming.
ARTWORK: MILAN IS POOR (2022)
Our latest project is now out in the wild. Truth be told, it has been roaming the internets for a while.
Starting in February 2022, we began taking screenshots of the weather app of the Apple iPhone, which includes daily air quality values based on the European Union Quality Index (EAQI) provided by BreezoMeter. Day after day, night after night, come rain or shine, the data show that the air quality in Milan mostly ranges from “Poor” to “Very Poor”. Chromatically, this is rendered with shades of crimson red and maroon. The irony is that Milan, one of the wealthiest cities in Europe is, in reality, poor — often extremely poor — when it comes to the most important indicator of all: the state of the environment. Truth be told, Milan is not only poor, but poisonous. On a daily basis, we posted a couple of screenshots on the Twitter account @matteobittanti; the performance is ongoing. In July 2022, we printed out a selection of screenshots from the series as postcards and we mailed them to the powers that be: The President of the Italian Republic; the Mayor of Milan; Lombardy Region’s President; the Director of the Triennale Museum**** among others.
These “postcards from Milan” are a reminder that this city (this region) is consistently in the red zone.