Between utopia and dystopia.

Under the effects of climate change, the trees in our regions face unprecedented threats. Lack of water and rising temperatures weaken their balance, paving the way for the proliferation of bark beetles, those tiny insects that devour our forests. In this way, spruces, chestnuts, ashes, beeches, and firs are slowly disappearing.

Some, however, endure. Their roots delve deeper, their foliage retains moisture more effectively, and their respiration slows. The holm oak, for instance, embodies this capacity to survive. But the solution does not lie in the hasty introduction of exotic species: only native trees, nourished by the memory of local soils and climates, will be able to fully adapt to these changes.

Antony Squizzato, for his part, exists in this tension between threat and hope. In summer, the heat overwhelms him, confines him, even stirring a form of eco-anxiety. Deprived of light, he takes refuge in the shadows, forced to turn his gaze inward, toward an imagination where other possibilities take shape.

From this withdrawal emerges the Walking Trees series. Here, trees, weary of human inaction, transform into travelers. Equipped with legs, they leave their scorched lands and set off toward more hospitable regions. This botanical fable resonates with human migrations already underway—those caused by rising waters or parched soils—and with those yet to come, inevitable migrations in which water will become a vital and contested resource.

But behind this apparent lightness lies a serious message. The artist chooses to address the climate emergency with a luminous, almost playful aesthetic, like a Trojan horse: the eye is seduced, then the mind pauses, reflects, and becomes concerned.