Dear colleagues and friends,
Welcome to issue no. 1 of The AnimalFarm Dispatch, the newsletter of the ongoing ERC StG project with perhaps the most Orwellian name.
Since the start of the project on February 1, I have slowly begun to get acquainted with both the good and the bad—the wonderful opportunity to set up a new team, and the perils of navigating Italian bureaucracy. However, I don’t know whether it is the energy of springtime—the only time of the year when the weather is bearable in the Po Valley—but my initial level of enthusiasm remains quite high.
I have been waiting a few weeks before sending out this email: so much has been happening lately that I often felt the urge to share updates immediately. But today is the day!
Recruiting
Let’s start with the most important announcements. We have just launched two positions for the AnimalFarm team. Please feel free to share the news and contact me by email for inquiries.
– A project manager, working part-time on AnimalFarm and part-time in the research office of the Department of Architecture and Design. The selected candidate will be based in Torino, in the seventeenth-century Baroque setting of the Castello del Valentino. A working knowledge of Italian is required. More information is available here.
– A first (out of three) PhD position, focusing on a dissertation tentatively titled The Agrarian Villa as Multispecies Architecture, ca. 1500–1600. The selected candidate will be enrolled in the PhD program “Architecture. History and Project” at the Department of Architecture and Design. The position will run from November 2026 to November 2029, with the possibility of a six-month extension. More information on the position can be found here and you can also download the call for applications.
News from the farm
As mentioned in the previous issue, I was invited to deliver a talk for the OFFISS seminar series at the University of Bologna. I would like to thank once again Paolo Savoia and Miriam Borgia for making this possible. We discussed fascist modernities and the afterlife of the fascist zootechnical project on Italian dairy farms—like most things fascist, an unsurprisingly long afterlife.
On March 2, the symposium Doing Veterinary Work: Care, Conflict, and Compromise in Italian Livestock Farming took place. The event was brilliantly coordinated by Luciano Ferrari, PhD candidate within the ERC StG VetValues project, and I was very happy to host it at the Castello del Valentino—which, I discovered, briefly served as a veterinary school at the beginning of the nineteenth century. The symposium brought together anthropologists, veterinary doctors, animal welfare experts, and historians to explore the interplay between management and ethics in the daily lives of those working in animal care. I would also like to thank Else Vogel, PI of VetValues, for supporting the event.
Those of you I have met in recent weeks know that I absolutely loved the Why Look at Animals? exhibition at the EMST museum in Athens, curated by Katerina Gregos. The show was both painful and moving, and it left me with conflicting emotions. Between the lines of the many artworks, both the architecture of the cage and that of the factory emerged. I attempted to convey these reflections in a review published in the Giornale dell’Architettura. I am also pleased to share that the review provided an opportunity to launch a new special collection of the journal, which will serve as a repository of articles, reviews, and interviews related to AnimalFarm.
The aim of this collection is to broaden our collective understanding of the industrial farm and of the zootechnical landscape as complex phenomena situated at the intersection of industrial practices, cultural values, and ethical controversies. If you are interested in contributing, please feel free to get in touch.
Igor Grubić, Do Animals…?, 2017. EMST Museum, Athens, 2026.
Looking ahead, I would like to share a few upcoming events in the following weeks.
• Next week, on April 2, at Università Ca’ Foscari in Venice, I will deliver the talk On Zootechnical Architecture as part of the Critical Animal Studies seminar coordinated by Federica Timeto. I would like to thank her for the kind invitation. I hope the talk will offer an opportunity to reflect on zootechnical architecture from a CAS perspective, with particular attention to the role of animal labor and gender in industrial farming.
• On April 22, the exhibition Convivium: Food Systems at the Limit will open at the Architekturmuseum der TUM, Munich. The show is curated by Andjelka Badnjar and Andres Lepik. Víctor Muñoz Sanz and I have co-curated the section titled “The Animal Is Present,” focusing on the architecture and design of dairy barns, in collaboration with Dániel Szalai, Nikos Katsikis, and Johannes Schwartz.
The section explores the dichotomies of cattle farming and the foodscapes of milk and beef through a paradox: although the section is about cows and bulls, real animals are not the primary focus. Instead, animals are evoked through a series of installations that allow visitors to experience the design, complexities, and controversies of industrial cattle farming.
The exhibition will run until October 18, 2026. The day after the opening, on April 23, a symposium will take place at the Vorhoelzer Forum at TUM. I hope to see you there! And if you cannot make it to Munich, you can at least grab a copy of the catalogue, beautifully produced by the curators and published by ArchiTangle.
Edited by Andjelka Badnjar and Andres Lepik.
Víctor Muñoz Sanz and I contributed to the catalogue with a short essay on the material technosystem of cattle farming. Our reflections resonate with the wise words of Dinesh Wadiwel in a recent article on the factory farm as a site of confrontation between machines and animals.
• During the month of May, AnimalFarm will launch its first seminar series. The seminars will be held at the Castello del Valentino, with the possibility of attending online. Titles are still being finalized, and additional speakers will join soon, but please save the following dates for now. Flyers will be circulated closer to the events.
May 18, 3–5 PM (CET) – Mariachiara Ficarelli, PhD candidate at Harvard Anthropology, on poultry farming, biomethane, and animal waste in the Veneto region.
June 3, 3–5 PM (CET) – Lisa Carignani, PhD in Architecture (Università Roma Tre), on the speciesist origins of architecture.
Currently on our table (AnimalFarm doesn’t eat meat—but books)
This section turns to fiction for this issue.
I have recently read two brilliant novels set along the blurred ethical boundary between farming and slaughter. One is Of Cattle and Men by Brazilian author Ana Paula Maia (De Gados e Homens, 2013). I was fascinated by the protagonist, Edgar Wilson, who looks into the eyes of cows before stunning them, looking for a way to decipher their meaning—and sees nothing.
The other is the deeply disturbing Tender Is the Flesh (Cadáver exquisito, 2017) by Argentine novelist Agustina Bazterrica—a dystopian journey into a society where all animals have been culled due to a virus. Humans soon discover they cannot live without meat and turn to human farming and cannibalism. A metaphor for capitalism?
On a brighter note, to close this issue, I am currently catching up with a cornerstone of Russian literature, Anna Karenina. I find Tolstoy’s description of Konstantin Levin’s affection for his cow, Pava, deeply moving:
“But there was one fortunate and important event: Pava, his best, his most beautiful cow, which he had bought at the cattle-show, had calved. “Kuzma, give me my tulup. And you,” said he to the intendant, "get a lantern. I will go and see her." The stable for the cattle was immediately behind the house. Crossing the courtyard, where the snow was heaped under the lilac bushes, he stepped up to the stable. As he opened the frosty door, he was met by the warm fumes of manure, and the cows, astonished at the unwonted light of the lantern, stirred on their fresh straw. The light fell on the broad black back of his piebald Holland cow. Berkut, the bull, with a ring in his nose, tried to get to his feet, but changed his mind, and only snorted as they passed by. The beautiful Pava, huge as a hippopotamus, was lying near her calf, snuffing at it, and protecting it against those who would come too close. Levin entered the stall, examined Pava, and lifted the calf, spotted with red and white, on its long, awkward legs. Pava began to low with anxiety, but was reassured when the calf was restored to her, and began to lick it with her rough tongue. The calf hid its nose under its mother's side, and frisked its tail.”
Until next time,
Sofia/ERC AnimalFarm
Image references, from top to bottom:
Telemaco Signorini, Pascoli a Castiglioncello, 1861 (now showing in this exhibition on the Macchiaioli painters in Milan).
Igor Grubić, Do Animals…?, 2017. EMST Museum, Athens. Photo by Sofia Nannini, 2026.
Convivium: Food Systems at the Limit, edited by Andjelka Badnjar and Andres Lepik (ArchiTangle, 2026). Book cover.