There is now an enormous portrait of Fyodor Dostoevsky in a wheat field in northern Italy.
You might think you love Dostoevsky, but do you love him more than Dario Gambarin does? To commemorate the writer’s 200th birthday (which is technically not until November 11th), the Italian land artist carved his likeness in 25,000 meters of wheat stubble in Castagnaro, Italy, using a tractor, plow, and rotary harrow. The title of the portrait is “Beauty will save us,” which is a line from Dostoevsky’s The Idiot.
“I believe that people can do without many things, but not beauty, the splendor of truth itself,” Gambarin said in a statement. “Beauty and harmony will save us from this pandemic—beauty in the sense of safeguarding of the environment as Dostoevsky himself reminds us: ‘We are in paradise, but we refuse to see it.'”
Gambarin has also created wheat field portraits of Dante, Beethoven, Pope Francis, and Greta Thunberg, as well as Donald Trump, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, and even Vladimir Putin. Here’s just a peek at how it’s done:
Emily Temple
Emily Temple is the managing editor at Lit Hub. Her first novel, The Lightness, was published by William Morrow/HarperCollins in June 2020. You can buy it here.
