Location: ITALIA

Chianda e Ndrezza is a photographic project that tells the story of tradition and community, exploring the lives of a group of women from Vatolla, a small village in Cilento. In this corner of the world, these women continue to cultivate the Vatolla onion, a biodiversity treasure that has endured through time.

The title, which in the Cilentano dialect means “plant and intertwine,” symbolically expresses the union between the land and the people, between the past and the present. Through the images, the project follows the entire process of onion cultivation, from sowing to harvest, immersing the viewer in the gestures and rituals that accompany each phase of the work.

Each phase is celebrated with traditional cilentano songs, some of which are invocations against the evil eye, passed down from mother to daughter as a sacred protection against forces that could threaten the harvest. These rituals, deeply rooted in local culture, represent not only a bond with the land but also an act of resistance and collective identity. Chianda e Ndrezza is a tribute to rural life, the traditions that survive through time, and the strength of the women who, with care and determination, continue this centuries-old practice.

ABOUT BARBARA DI MAIO

Barbara Di Maio has been passionate about photography from a very young age. Conference interpreter and translator, she attended the ICP (International Center of Photography) in New York, where she honed her photographic technique, specializing in fashion and portrait photography. She won a scholarship for the Master’s in Photojournalism and Reportage at the School of Photography and Cinema in Rome. For over ten years, she has focused primarily on anthropological and social photography, exploring and documenting folklore and ancient traditions in Campania and throughout Italy. In 2017, she organized her first solo exhibition Japan Katana Urban Cuts, an unprecedented look at Japan and Tokyo, reconstructed through a visual journey that plays with colors and references to modernity and the frantic pace of the Japanese metropolis. Her photographs have been awarded and published in international photography magazines and collectives. For her project A’ Maschkarata. she was selected by the Digital Archive Futuro Arcaico as an artist for research on territorial identity and folklore. Her project The Mysteries of Trapani was recently published in the art magazine MoleArt. She is currently collaborating with the Central Institute for Intangible Heritage on the project “Intangible Ties in Festive Landscapes”, a project that won the Photography Strategy 2022 call for proposals, promoted and supported by the Ministry of Culture, Directorate General for Contemporary Creativity.