Former Pietro Caruso Hospital Complex
The complex of the former "Pietro Caruso" Hospital
In 1537, Pietro Caruso, Governor of Sambuca and philanthropist, founded a monumental complex along the main thoroughfare of the town, in front of the current Piazza della Vittoria. This complex, now named after him, comprised a hospital, a clock tower, and a church. The three original functions and different construction periods are evident in the three architectural sections of the building, which occupies a city block bordered by Via Beccadelli, Baglio Grande, Via Pietro Caruso, and Corso Umberto I. The façade of the building is imposing. Its main features—the still vertical thrust, the robust walls, the slightly emphasized rusticated base, and the anthropomorphic masks—clearly indicate the transition from the Late Gothic style to Mannerism. The hospital remained operational until 1968. Today, it hosts cultural activities.
The Civic Tower
Attached to the complex is the Civic Tower, featuring a double-cell belfry—reconfigured in 2000—and the clock below it. A spiral staircase with monolithic sandstone steps provides access to the clock room, which houses a mid-19th-century mechanism: a small gem made by the Fratelli Terrile company of Recco, a historic clock manufacturer from Genoa. Here, we find an interesting and complex "time machine," consisting of dozens of gears and pendulums, with weights that powered the clock and traverse the entire height of the tower. In 2023, maintenance and restoration work was carried out on the clock and the bells, entrusted to the Trapani-based company “I Manutentori del Tempo” by Danilo Gianformaggio. This company has been operating in Sicily for several years and has, among other projects, restored the astronomical clock of Torre Oscura in Trapani, the clock of the Chiesa Madre in Calatafimi, and the clock of the Cathedral of Monreale.
The Church of Saints Fabiano e Sebastiano
Adjacent to the Civic Tower and the hospital itself is the Church of Saints Fabiano and Sebastiano, which Caruso funded personally. The place of worship, suppressed in 1866, had only the surrounding walls remaining until the restoration, which highlight the transition from Late Gothic to Mannerism. Its former eighteenth-century church was demolished after the 1968 earthquake using bulldozers and mechanical shovels, despite not presenting any serious risk of collapse. The upper part of the façade on the main street, which had a notable scenic effect, was also demolished. The interior was adapted as a hospital from the second half of the nineteenth century until 1968, the year of the Belice earthquake which led to its closure. Today, the former church, restored, hosts cultural and exhibition activities and, in 2024, thanks to the Sambuca Welcoming project for the cultural enhancement of Corso Umberto I funded by the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Tourism, it has become the Creativity Lab of the village: a multifunctional space for events, workshops, temporary exhibitions, installations, artistic residencies, and their presentations to the community and visitors, temporary citizens of Sambuca.
“Il riparo”: the work by Karl Logge and Marta Romani, resident artists of Sambuca Welcoming
Inside the Creativity Lab is "Il riparo," a work created during the first Artist Residency of the "Sambuca Welcoming" project by the artist duo Karl Logge and Marta Romani. Originating from Sydney, Australia, and Brescia, Italy, respectively, the artists engaged the Sambuca community in their work. The installation consists of a tapestry and a visual document that capture the artistic process involving the study of the local area, spinning and weaving workshops—both outdoors and within the Creativity Lab space—as well as the integration into the life of the village and the involvement of the community. This collaboration, involving spindles and looms, aims to revive a sense of sociality that has been lost in today's hyper-connected, digital, and individualistic world, by embracing an ancient, sustainable, communal, and identity-rich practice like spinning and weaving. The textile artwork features an old local fabric adorned with handcrafted pieces made from Sardinian and local Sicilian wool, dyed with natural colors and woven on rudimentary, portable wooden looms by the artists together with community members—men, women, the elderly, adults, and children, both residents and temporary visitors of the Creativity Lab. The work is inspired by the local area, particularly the Riparo di San Giovanni, a prehistoric archaeological site in Sambuca with over 400 vertical and geometric linear wall engravings typical of the Mediterranean between the Late Paleolithic and Neolithic periods. Near the site, remains of Neolithic huts and scattered ceramics suggest a rock shelter that was likely a communal sacred meeting place as well as a significant workshop for lithic industry, given the large quantity of flint cores found.
The artist redisency “Acchiappasegni | SpinLab + LanWeave” by Karl Logge and Marta Romani
The residency project by Karl and Marta, “Acchiappasegni | SpinLab + LanWeave,” was one of the two winners—selected from over 130 applications from around the world—of the international open call on art and urban regeneration launched as part of “Sambuca Welcoming.” For five weeks, between October and November 2023, the two artists brought their Textile Art project to life in the village. This project, which begins with signs, traces, and emblematic symbols from the area around Sambuca di Sicilia, revitalizes these elements through essential artistic processes of spinning and weaving, aiming to connect community, time, memory, landscape, and thought.
A couple of artists in their profession and in life. In Sardinia, at Chiara Vigo’s school
Logge and Romani, an artistic and life couple who met during a residency at Cittadellarte Fondazione Pistoletto in 2012, live and work in Sardinia, on the island of Sant’Antioco. They moved there in 2014 to study with Chiara Vigo, a master of traditional weaving. Karl is a designer, artist, and academic specializing in sustainable futures theory, speculative scenarios, and design philosophy. He has worked with major institutions such as the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney, the Brisbane Museum, the Royal Botanic Gardens in Melbourne, and the Auckland Triennale. His practice has involved a diverse range of activities, from Tai Chi interventions and karaoke performances to working with native bees, pickled fruit, and delirious sweets to inform the creation of hybrid artifacts and whimsical situations. Since moving to Italy, he has used this experience to complete a Ph.D. on radical sustainable practices and unconventional design. Marta has a background in fine arts and decoration, specializing in the educational qualities of art in various educational contexts. She has a degree in animation and, after working on various broadcasts, short films, and illustration projects, turned to art using video, audio, animation, illustration, and painting alongside weaving, embroidery, and natural dyeing. Interested in blending personal and universal aspects to tell stories about who we are and where we are going, she focuses on the process of textile art, where memory is transmitted through repetitive gestures, the creation of signs, and the exchange space found in teaching and learning. Combining their extensive range of interests, skills, and experiences, they have collaborated with various institutions, including the New European Bauhaus Festival in Brussels, the Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin, Georges River Air and Ironbark Gallery in Sydney, Nature Art and Habitat Residency in Val Taleggio, Cittadellarte Fondazione Pistoletto in Biella, Borgo degli Artisti and Mostra Mercato in Bienno, BOOM Festival in Portugal, The Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney and Auckland Triennale, and in Sicily, with Kòrai - Territorio, Sviluppo e Cultura at the Comune di Sambuca di Sicilia. Their art is influenced by the deep time of places, cycles, and seasons, closely connected to nature, territory, and cultural memory. By working with color, time, repetition, and nature, they create works that mobilize the space of art as a realm of memory, involving material alchemy and timeless gestures of weaving as a platform for generating new modes of transmission, exchange, and encounter. In their work, they combine live art, specific material inquiries, and site-responsive installations, exploring how ancient aspects of weaving, spinning, and death can be used to address themes of crisis, adaptation, and interconnectedness.