Shamar. An Apparent Boundary, the photographic project by Giuseppe Curcio, stems from a specific news event but unfolds as a broader reflection on landscape and on the fragility of the boundaries we draw across nature. Created during an artist residency at Archivio Atena, the project was photographed between June and September 2025.

In 2021, the Vallo di Diano was the site of a series of illegal toxic waste dumpings. Operation Shamar, conducted by the Provincial Command of the Carabinieri of Salerno, brought to light one of the most serious episodes in the Atena Scalo area, where highly dangerous substances were dispersed, including waste oil classified as HP14, ecotoxic. The issue concerns not only the nature of the materials involved, but above all their ability to spread through the ground: a contaminating liquid can be absorbed by the soil and, through rainwater, reach underground aquifers, which flow without respecting the visible boundaries on the surface.

It is from this contradiction that Curcio’s research takes shape. Starting from the operation that gives the project its title, the photographer focuses on the plots of land in Atena Scalo, questioning how real a boundary can be when it exists only on the surface. The images do not seek the sensationalism of environmental emergency, but instead move along a line of analytical observation, attentive to the signs and transformations that run through the territory.

The gaze thus settles on the geometry of the agricultural plots, on the chromatic variations of the soil, on the plant species that inhabit it, and on the infrastructures that run through it, such as drainage channels or the traces of hydrogeological remediation work. Elements that, when observed together, build a visual map of the relationship between landscape, human activity, and contamination.

The title itself takes on a symbolic value. Shamar, a Hebrew word meaning “to guard” or “to take care of,” also turns the project into an invitation to responsibility toward the land and its preservation.

In the practice of Giuseppe Curcio, born in Catanzaro in 2001, the documentation of spaces is intertwined with a research into the phenomena and processes that shape contemporary reality, often investigating the hybridization between natural and artificial elements.

In Shamar. An Apparent Boundary, the landscape of the Vallo di Diano appears orderly and divided into defined plots, but Curcio’s research shows how this apparent stability is crossed by invisible dynamics that make every boundary far more fragile than it seems. Photography thus becomes a tool for questioning what lies beneath the surface.