310 km walking, 45 authors from Italy, Slovenia and Austria, a new border narrative
2025 // CAMPOROSSO – MALGA CASON DI LANZA
WALKING ALONG THE THRESHOLD, WHERE BORDERS DON'T SHOW UP
Janine Schemmer, Nicolò Giraldi
Walking along the border between Italy and Austria, our perception of the border, which is reflected in these texts, changed step by step. Unlike last year's walk in the Julian Alps, where the border runs high on the peaks, this year its traces accompanied us every day. Although numerous boundary stones mark its presence, this border has another quality. Soft and alive, also for topographical reasons, it represents a green threshold that led us over mountain pastures and through woods, where cows and horses still graze today. We met few people, apart from a few tourists disguised as hikers. Inhabited villages were rare. Those who took part in the fourth edition of WTL came from France, Germany, England, Italy and Slovenia. Many languages were spoken and mixed together - there was the border. A temporary community, steps and words together. But behind all this contamination, many questions remain. How can we perceive those elements that have left few traces? How difficult is it to grasp a border that does not exist? Are Carinthian songs blaring from an Alpine radio station enough, or does its image manifest itself exclusively ex post, in the epiphanies that memories provide? Perhaps the answer lies precisely in the story of emotions. We use them, sometimes they disappear forever, other times they enjoy a limited life: they are words that we keep alive in their relentless struggle against extinction. But they are actions, shared experiences silenced by standardisation and which no one remembers anymore. Along this border, more than others, memory is a perpetual echo. Voices that jump from one language to another, unmistakable in their elusive quality. Habits that are lost and reshaped in that space – a neutral dimension – that is grafted where absence reigns. A silence that warns more than any control.
WALKING ALONG THE THRESHOLD, WHERE BORDERS DON'T SHOW UP
Janine Schemmer, Nicolò Giraldi
Walking along the border between Italy and Austria, our perception of the border, which is reflected in these texts, changed step by step. Unlike last year's walk in the Julian Alps, where the border runs high on the peaks, this year its traces accompanied us every day. Although numerous boundary stones mark its presence, this border has another quality. Soft and alive, also for topographical reasons, it represents a green threshold that led us over mountain pastures and through woods, where cows and horses still graze today. We met few people, apart from a few tourists disguised as hikers. Inhabited villages were rare. Those who took part in the fourth edition of WTL came from France, Germany, England, Italy and Slovenia. Many languages were spoken and mixed together - there was the border. A temporary community, steps and words together. But behind all this contamination, many questions remain. How can we perceive those elements that have left few traces? How difficult is it to grasp a border that does not exist? Are Carinthian songs blaring from an Alpine radio station enough, or does its image manifest itself exclusively ex post, in the epiphanies that memories provide? Perhaps the answer lies precisely in the story of emotions. We use them, sometimes they disappear forever, other times they enjoy a limited life: they are words that we keep alive in their relentless struggle against extinction. But they are actions, shared experiences silenced by standardisation and which no one remembers anymore. Along this border, more than others, memory is a perpetual echo. Voices that jump from one language to another, unmistakable in their elusive quality. Habits that are lost and reshaped in that space – a neutral dimension – that is grafted where absence reigns. A silence that warns more than any control.