e l i z a b e t h  p o r t e r


The most malleable and ductile of all metals,
 a single gram can be beaten into a square meter; so thin as to become translucent.
A good conductor of electricity and heat; reflecting infra red radiation; denser than lead. 
It is unaffected by air, moisture and most corrosive agents, making it tasteless and orderless.
While everything around it disintegrates, it endures, unchanging.

Each afternoon I walk down to the bar at the bottom of the village.
Over coffee, stumbling with my meager Italian, their lack of English,
there are those who try to describe where their house is, so that I might mark and acclaim it,
others prefer their buildings unsullied by this glittering veneer, scrubbing the stone clean when I have gone.
Amongst the maze of these streets and tunnels I lose my way; cannot remember any of their instructions.
 I leave the gold  glimmering where my eye catches in the shadows and scars.






20Eventi  Sabina, Italy. May 2008
1.5 grams English gold leaf distributed throughout the village of Bocciniano.