SARDINIA: A JOURNEY INTO THE ARTIST’S SOULS 

Imagine yourself in a land where the wild beauty of landscapes captures the soul, a land where enterprising artists have found inspiration and transformed their experiences into timeless works of art. 

This is Sardinia, a jewel in the heart of the Mediterranean Sea, which has enchanted and inspired travelers and natives for centuries. In this journey through Sardinia, we encounter the stories of three artists, each with their own unique vision of this extraordinary land, united by a visceral passion for its beauty and spiritually. 

They were predominantly writers, novelists and journalists, but also linguists, photographers, ecclesiastes and archeologists. From the early nineteenth century, amidst the Romantic era, a new phenomenon emerged: the rediscovery of Sardinia by travelers often driven by the desire to explore the diverse realities of an Island culturally distant from the rest of Europe and which for centuries had remained outside the traditional itineraries. 

DAVID HERBERT LAWRENCE: SOUL EXPLORER IN SARDINIA (1921)

David Herbert Lawrence, the visionary writer, made his pilgrimage across the Island in 1921, accompanied by his beloved wife, captivated by its wild beauty and intrinsic mysteries. 

“It is said neither the Romans, nor the Phoenicians, Greeks or Arabs ever subdued Sardinia. It is outside the circuits of civilization.”

D. H. Lawrence 

They departed from Cagliari, the white city that rises like a Mediterranean Jerusalem. With its luminous granite and silence that seems to absorb time itself. From there, they ventured into the untamed lands of Barbagia, through dusty and winding roads, until they reached the spectacular coasts of Olbia, where the crystal-clear and unpredictable sea embraced the land with ancestral force. In these wild lands, Lawrence found inspiration for his magisterial work, “Sea and Sardinia”, in which he vividly depicted the ancient and mysterious soul of this millenia-old land. 

“Sardinia is the place where colors are born before spreading into the world.”ù

D. H. Lawrence 

His poetic gaze captured the wild beauty of the rugged coastlines, the vitality of the sea roaring against the cliffs, and the spirituality that permeates every corner of this sacred and profane land. 

“Sardinia is something else: broader, much more ordinary, not at all irregular, but disappearing into the distance. Hill ridges like heather, irrelevant, losing themselves, perhaps, towards a group of peaks. 

Enchanting space around and distance to travel, nothing finished, nothing defined. It is like freedom itself.”

D. H. Lawrence 

GRAZIA DELEDDA: THE SARDINIA’S VOICE IN ETERNAL NOVELS 

Grazia Deledda, daughter of this land and winner of tgìhe Nobel Prize in Literature in 1926, dedicated her life and works to sardinia, making it the undisputed protagonist of her poetically infused stories. 

“I have had all the things a woman can ask of her destiny, but great above all fortune the faith in life and in God. I have lived with the winds, with the woods, with the mountains. I have watched for days, months and years, the slow unfolding of clouds in the Sardinian sky.”

G. Deledda 

In her novels, Deledda describes with meticulous precision the rugged and enchanting landscapes of her homeland: fields of wheat swaying in the wind, wooded hills enveloped in the scent of juniper, rocky coasts lapped by impetuous waves. 

Among her most famous works are “Reed in the Wild”, “Ashes” and “The Mother”. Through her words, she transports us on a timeless journey through the history, culture and immutable beauty of this land that continues to enchant and inspire. 

“We are Sardinians. We are Spanish, African, Phoenician, Carthaginian, Roman, Arab, Pisan, Byzantine, Piedmontese. We are the golden yellow brooms that rain down on rocky paths like large lit lamps. We are wild solitude, immense and deep silence, the splendor of the sky, the white flower of the rockrose. We are the uninterrupted reign of the mastic, of the waves that trickle over ancient granites, of the dog rose, of the wind, of the immensity of the sea. We are an ancient land of long silences, of wide and pure horizons, of dark plants, of mountains burnt by the sun and by revenge. We are Sardinians.”

G. Deledda 

PAOLO FRESU: SARDINIAN CONTEMPORARY ENCHANTED NOTES 

Paolo Fresu, a brilliant trumpeter and composer who embodies the soul of Sardinia through music. Thanks to his evocative and suggestive melodies, Fresu transports us on a sensory journey through the sounds and unique atmospheres of his homeland. 

As he recounts in his biography “Music Inside”, “The sounds were already in my childhood at five, six years old. First there were those of the wind, water, leaves and oaks.”

His music celebrates the majesty of Sardinian nature, the call of the sea cradling its rugged coasts, the breath of the wind through the golden wheat field. Through the Time in Jazz Festival, an event held every year in the heart of Sardinia, Fresu offers the opportunity to immerse themselves in this love tribute to his land, a sonic journey that captures the beauty and millenia-old history of this ancient land. 

“I had the great fortune to be born in sardinia. On an Island where famously one does not age and where the world, sometimes, seems to be far away, for better or for worse.”

Paolo Fresu 

This profound bond was also celebrated on the occasion of his fiftieth birthday, through the design and realization of a Festival called “Fifty Years Played”: an extraordinary event, fifty concerts, over fifty consecutive days, each one of the fifty stunning and suggestive locations in Sardinia, selected for the occasion by Fresu. 

A vibrant and emotional ode to his land, a perfect symphony of emotions, music and nature. 

SARDINIA: AN INVITATION TO DREAM 

Together, through their works, Lawrence, Deledda and Fresu lead us on an exciting journey through Sardinia, a place where the wild beauty and pure soul of this millenia-old land continue to enchant and inspire anyone fortunate enough to traverse it. 

We hope these stories have made you dream, evoked pleasant memories and piqued your curiosity about the wonders of this land.

Let yourself be fascinated by its timeless beauty.