From the distinguished Italian artist Alessandro Sanna, an astonishing series of wordless paintings highlighting people, inhumanity, and war, while exploring the creative and destructive power of our hands. Selected as one of Kirkus Reviews' "Must-Read Spring Highlights."

A stone falls to Earth. It gains speed, rolling down the steep side of a mountain until it stops in an empty plain. But the plain will not remain empty for long: from the shadows, two figures appear, who immediately begin to fight, using this stone as a weapon to kill. But these same hands, our human hands, holding the same weight of the stone, also shape and sculpt, carve and build, creating as they destroy, capturing beauty and violence simultaneously.

What is the relationship between these dual instincts? In these pages, artist Alessandro Sanna uses the shaping power of his hands to explore the seemingly endless, paradoxically persistent human capacity for destruction. Fearlessly, he observes the long history of war, from the chaos of armies on horseback, the violence of the conquistadors, the slaughter of World War I, to the horrific terror of the atomic bomb and the harsh, shockingly deliberate attack on the Twin Towers, Sanna records our obsession with destruction.

Hands mold clay, spread color on a sky, define a world, give beauty to the eye, and yet fires burn, a caustic smell arises, smoke covers the sun. For whom and why?

Includes an introduction by acclaimed poet and scholar Ammiel Alcalay, as well as a note from the artist.

Pages: 188, Year of Publication: 0313, Dimensions: 20x20cm