Bleeding on the Page, A Body of Words- Orlo Mendittorosa Versi Collection - Anne Sophie Behaghel & Stefania Squeglia 2020
Brooke Shaden, Arianna Puci and Edie Howell
I am by all accounts a strange, peculiar, kind of writer, drawn to those who walk the ‘edges’ of things and draw out from the very core, something of the Immortal. So it is with all those who create, writers, artists, musicians, perfumers, those who dare, who walk their edges with pristine dexterity, excite me. Stefania Squeglia of Italian house Mendittorosa is one.
Her creations are always unique in their breadth, depth and rare authenticity, so of course I am drawn like the proverbial moth, yearning to explore more especially two of her most recent releases, Orlo and Athanor. Orlo is the second chapter of the Versi Trilogy, transmuting the poem, ‘Edge’ by Sylvia Plath, a poem written in the last few days of her life. A disturbing yet vibrantly raw and intense prose.. reading it questioning thoughts rose and fell within me, why do I write, why do all writers write, perhaps like any creative we long to create a body with our words, a body that has permanance and will outlive our physicality. An urging to place on paper what resides at the very core of who we are so perhaps we may be seen … in anonymity yet also in intimacy.
‘There is a melancholy yearning in blank pages
For the breath of immortal vapours to part the oceans of mediocrity
like the warmth of thighs
The yearning to be writ upon,
a touch of God’s on fleshy parchment’
DsF 17
Only in the writing can we place our true selves in plain view, any other exposure is unthinkable.
Painted on Skin - Arianna
Orlo is a poignant tribute which takes flight like words uttered and let loose to flutter, fragments of verse lifted high upon the winds, to endlessly drift, alighting here and there to invoke and remain forever etched. The captured scent of emotion drenched paper is ever present, a medium of transference, flung in the fervent hope a hand may reach for it one day and in reading its scent riven words, comprehend the true nature of the author.
A curious portrait that reveals the tender vulnerability and absolute fragility that lies within the Soul of those you venture out beyond their confines. An urgency to bleed words onto parchment, to reveal all that consumes the writer internally, spilling ferocity, speaks through the Bergamot and Cumin entranced with the fee like quality of a diaphanous, watery Cyclamen. Urgency laced liberally with vulnerability, the need to externalise all. Sometimes just to exist does not speak the entirety of who we are, we must extend into more, Orlo touches me beyond touch with a complicity of a known other.
Hands- Body Scripture II - Ronit Bigal
Something of a precious nature is revealed here in Orlo, a gateway into the privacy of the guarded interior, its hallowed ground, for here is the raw, delicate sensibilty exposed, its Rose and Magnolia so exquisitely rendered of illusion there is no artifice left standing, a shattering of ego so profound as to be the beauty of life’s etching upon us, the lines we fracture upon ourselves in confrontation with brutal reality, inscribed ideliably in poignant marks. As it is upon us, so it is upon the page…….
A darting’will o’ the wisp’ melancholy is suffused throughout, yet not sadness at all just a bittersweet knowledge that for the sensitive ones everywhere, the modern world is complex and overwhelming at times, here in Orlo is a sanctuary of like kindred.
‘Only in this
Am I not Lost
Only in this
Ravelling of written form
Am I found
Only in this,
Ink bleed on parchment
Can I breathe.’
DsF
Capture - Marta Bevaqua, Sylvia Plath, Marta Bevaqua, Skin Calligraphy- Cornelia Caufmann, Kirsty Mitchell, Pokras Lampas.
Orlo is an embrace, a revelation of our human nature, put to flight by the world outside of our precious interior, its haunting timbre attuned with reasonant woods flows upon me with a tender recognition, I find myself on familiar ground. The rendition in scented terms of all we turn away from, eschew the torments and ecstacy of truly feeling human, a vertiable remembrance of what can be lost and what is of value.
for those who see, give such solace to the seen
those for whom invisibility is a cloaked neccesity
until alighted upon by eyes with no end….
DsF 19
Stefania Squeglia, Orlo - Mendittorosa, Anne Sophie Behaghel
Italian Bergamot OIL
Egyptian Cumin OIL
Fresh Cyclamen
Magnolia
Orange blossom
Metallic Rose
Peach
Indian Papyrus Wood OIL
Indonesian Patchouli brut OIL
Virginian Cedarwood OIL
Cashmere Wood
My thanks to a special perfume friend for my precious sample of Orlo. I treasure it.
Orlo and all the beautiful creations from Mendittorosa can be found here-
https://www.mendittorosa.com/
https://www.mendittorosa.com/boutique/mendittorosa/versi/orlo/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/mendittorosafragrances/
instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mendittorosa_odori_talismans/?hl=en
@danu_sf
@ode_ r_