Robida Magazine

Robida is a collective that works at the intersection of written and spoken words and spatial practices. It is developed in Topolò, a small town of 22 inhabitants on the border between Italy and Slovenia. Over the years, Robida has organized field recordings, landscape and architecture workshops, and symposiums. Since 2015, the collective has edited Robida Magazine, a multilingual cultural magazine, published once a year. In 2021, it opened two community spaces, one physical, Izba, a small coworking and hospitality space, and one immaterial, Radio Robida. In the same year, the collective also began to develop artist residencies, which adapted to Topolò and its specificities.

Robida will use the Visible Fellowship to produce the 11th issue of Robida Magazine, titled Orchard – Il paesaggio come frutteto (The landscape as an orchard).

The project will:

– Explore fruit trees and orchards as lenses to understand changing landscapes, human and non-human relationships, and the impact of the climate crisis on agriculture.

– Follow a seasonal, cyclical editorial process inspired by the life of a fruit tree: launching an open call (germination), developing and selecting contributions (growth and flowering), editing and curating (pollination), and finally designing, printing, and distributing the book (maturation and seed dispersal).

– Include interdisciplinary contributions from philosophy, art, architecture, ecology, botany, and agriculture, combining poetic, scientific, and narrative approaches.

– Make the often invisible processes of editorial production visible by narrating them as part of the content, connecting the magazine’s rhythm to the slow, situated life of the village of Topolò.

The fellowship funding will directly support the editorial work and fees for all editors involved, the design of the publication, and the printing and production costs of the magazine. This will result in a publication that not only documents and reflects on orchards and ecological care but also embodies an ecologically sensitive, place-based model of publishing.