Door een aardbeving verwoeste gebouwen te Messina 1908

Luca Comerio made this photographic print of earthquake-destroyed buildings in Messina. Looking at this image, I wonder what it was like for Comerio to be on site, pointing a camera at the destruction. You get the sense of the city’s vulnerability, the buildings reduced to rubble. The starkness of black and white renders the scene with a sense of immediacy. The composition emphasizes the scale of devastation; the perspective is one of witnessing something monumental. The artist is bringing order to chaos through the framing and focus. But what does it mean to make art from an earthquake?