Chincaglierie (Trinket)

One of the necklace’s small stones was tardy. Traveling on One Leg by Herta Muller

Chincaglierie (Trinket) is a kinetic installation that transforms recorded sound into vibration, movement, and unstable material resonance.

The work originated in 2015 in dialogue with Weave Along, a participatory action by artists Tatiana Villani, Manuela Mancioppi, and Emanuela Baldi, developed through the collective weaving of textile scraps and discarded materials gathered from local industries in Prato. Invited to document the process, I recorded the voices, gestures, footsteps, frictions, tears, rustles, and mechanical sounds produced throughout the action, collecting the sonic traces of a collective experience unfolding over time.

These recordings later became the basis for an electronic system specifically designed to transform sound into physical vibration. Through custom-built circuits, audio frequencies are converted into electrical impulses capable of activating vibration motors and small mechanical devices.

The vibrations set heterogeneous materials into motion. Golden and silver rings, guitar strings, nylon and cotton threads, beads, and aluminum structures generate a vibrating and unstable body composed of minute intertwined elements that animate and resonate according to the frequencies passing through them. The installation reflects on the transformation of sound into vibration, allowing the frequencies of collective experience to become visible. Each time, the work reassembles itself around different materials, memories, acoustics, and spatial configurations. Over time, Chincaglierie has taken on multiple forms and configurations, adapting itself to different spaces and contexts. From former industrial buildings connected to the textile history of Prato to the seventeenth-century spaces of Casa Masaccio and Casa Giovanni Mannozzi, from workers’ picket lines animated by chants and collective voices to Villa Galileo, where the work responded to cosmic signals and astrophysical soundscapes, the installation continuously reconfigures its materials, acoustics, and spatial relations according to the environment it inhabits.

Each iteration becomes a temporary assemblage of vibrations, materials, memories, and infrastructures. The work remains open, responsive, and resonant.

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