Claudia De Luca 's solo exhibition The sirocco rooms curated by Elisabetta Mero hosted from 8 to 24 July 2022 at the Basilica of San Celso.

On the occasion of the opening there will be Marta Dalla Via , actress, who will participate with a theatrical intervention. A counterpoint to listen to, earthy and straightforward for an installation to be seen, aerial and spiritual. Marta Dalla Via, invites the public to reflect on art as a cure in relation to the exhibition The rooms of the Scirocco with a personal thought dedicated to the artist Claudia De Luca, a friend and refuge for a long time.

The site specific project, created by Claudia De Luca for the Basilica, involves the creation of environments that refer to the "sirocco rooms", real underground or basement rooms dug into the rock below the palaces or in the gardens of the Palermitan villas between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries.

The rooms were used as a place of refuge and protection from the summer heat. Thanks to an ingenious system consisting of an artificial cave, an air current and the presence of water, in these places it was possible to pleasantly resist the summer heat. The exhibition takes its cue from this historical and architectural root that the artist imagines to "recreate" in the Basilica of San Celso.

The protagonist of the installation by Claudia De Luca is the tarlatana , an impalpable fabric, similar to gauze that is manipulated by the artist who creates rooms inside the Basilica for the occasion. Places where visitors can share a state of relief and pleasure. On display, scattered throughout the rooms, 100 small-format works (15 x 20 cm) to create a mosaic-carpet in which body fragments emerge as modern relics that the artist describes as follows: "Through a personal reinterpretation of my artistic practice, a light suspension emerges that invests both the body and the mind. When the melancholy of waiting and the stillness of silence spread over the bodies, the tissues try to give them a shape, bringing out skin, muscles and nerves on which to write an intimate and private narration ”.