A Civic Plaza Made of Light

Mathis Neuhaus: Do you still remember your first encounter with St. Moritz and what that encounter sparked?
Marinella Senatore: What struck me initially was the relationship between landscape and light. There is something cinematic and intimate in the way nature, architecture, weather, and human presence coexist in the Engadin. I often work with collective narratives, public rituals, and shared experiences. I perceived the Engadin as a place layered with stories, memory, and invisible traces. I was fascinated by the way the valley preserves a sense of community while remaining open to international exchanges and cultural crossings. For me, places are not only geographical spaces, but emotional and social landscapes shaped by the people who inhabit, pass through, and imagine them.

Did all this immediately make clear to you what you wanted to do here? Or, differently put: how did this first encounter with the region shape to become something more tangible, an idea for a work?
Early on, I understood that the idea of a “baroque machine” could become the right language for a project in St. Moritz. Baroque structures have always been part of my visual vocabulary. Historically, baroque ephemeral architectures, celebratory light structures and public festivities were devices for gathering people, creating moments of collective wonder and temporary communities.

In the Engadin, this intuition became even more meaningful because of the history of light in St. Moritz itself. I discovered that the Kulm Hotel was among the very first places in Switzerland to introduce electric light in the late nineteenth century. I imagine a temporary civic piazza made of light: a symbolic and emotional space where different communities can recognize themselves. Not only visitors, tourism or privilege, also workers, local associations, seasonal presences, multilingual realities and all the invisible energies that compose everyday life in the valley. I want the work to become a monument to people.

And how did this initial idea lead to meeting the local communities? I know that workshops took place in St. Moritz. Can you tell me about those?
The workshops in St. Moritz were a fundamental part of the process, because for me every project begins with listening. I never arrive with a fixed idea that people simply have to perform. Meeting the local communities meant spending time together, discussing what St. Moritz represents today and what it means to different people. As an iconic destination, but also as a living social landscape shaped by different realities. The workshops became an exchange between generations, backgrounds, professions, and personal histories.

What interests me most is always the human energy that develops through participation. During the workshops, people who had never met before began collaborating, and gradually building a sense of trust and openness. I was moved by the willingness of people to engage emotionally and collectively, despite coming from very different worlds. I think these encounters always leave traces on both sides. The participants contribute to shaping the work, but the work also becomes a way to rethink relationships, visibility, and belonging within a community.

Over the years, you must have worked with thousands, if not millions of different people. This poses the question: is it always easy for you to connect?
People immediately understand when something is artificial or instrumental. I want to create real situations of listening and trust. After so many years of working collectively, I have learned that every community has its own rhythm and emotional temperature. You cannot enter a space assuming that everyone will immediately open up. Sometimes people are shy, skeptical, tired, angry, emotionally unavailable, or simply not used to being invited into artistic processes in a non-hierarchical way.

What I try to do first is remove judgment. I am not interested in virtuosity or perfection. Once people understand that there is no “right way” to participate, things start shifting. Collective work can be emotionally intense and exhausting. I don’t romanticize it. But for me this complexity is what makes it meaningful and politically alive. My position regarding participation is radical. Participation cannot mean involving only people who are already similar to me, who already share the same beliefs, visions, or cultural codes. That would contradict the point. What continues to fascinate me is unpredictability. Every time I begin a project, I know that the people involved will transform the work in ways I could never fully anticipate.

And then there is also the body. Very often we begin not by talking too much, but through breathing, rhythm, walking, voice, movement, or simple collective somatic exercises. The body can create trust much faster than language sometimes. This is why I became increasingly interested in somatic practices and collective movement over the years.

This summer, a light sculpture of yours will be revealed in St. Moritz, a „civic plaza“ for the village, as you call it. Conceived on the basis of meeting the communities of the village. Will the communities have a further role in what you have planned? And: can people who read this get involved?
When people read the conceived phrases that were written by other people, a kind of mirror system is created. We recognize ourselves in others, even in the simplicity of someone else’s gesture or choice. It’s fundamental for participatory art to create emotional and neurological mechanisms of recognition. This is already a first level of activation that participatory art can generate within a community.

Another aspect I find very important is that these spaces naturally become places where things happen: symbolically, but also very concretely. Working with luminarias means working with a temporary, ephemeral architecture that does not overwrite the surrounding natural or architectural landscape, but integrates into it. Historically, luminarias were created as gathering spaces: special spaces for special occasions, where collective experiences could unfold. Over the years, I have witnessed this happen in every community where my works have been installed, whether outdoors, indoors, or within the context of major biennials. The works become meeting points, landmarks, appointments. Performances emerge, citizens use them as stages for dance or photography, and unexpected forms of collective life appear around them. I believe the theatrical quality that is inherent in the South Italian Baroque tradition of luminarias can still generate a shared energy today.

Lastly, I would like to ask for your advice as someone who travels a lot: what is your suggestion for moving through the world? Going from one place to the next?
For nearly twenty years my life has been nomadic, but I have always moved following the flow of the communities I was living and working with. I don’t really have the spirit of a tourist. When I arrive somewhere, I’m not interested in checking off monuments or following an itinerary. What interests me are people: how they move, speak, walk through a place, how they inhabit a landscape. I think there is an enormous freedom in deciding how one wants to travel and experience the world, and I value that freedom very deeply.

Photography:
Portrait – ©Mazen Jannoun
Marinella Senatore, Dior Cruise 2021. Piazza Duomo, Lecce. Credits A. Garofalo. Courtesy The Artist and Dior