When we rang the bellsMonastero di Santa Chiara, Camerino

“When we rang the bells for the first time after the earthquake, people wept with emotion. The bells hadn’t rung for two years.”

On September 16, 2018, the Monastery of the Poor Clares of Saint Clare in Camerino reopened its doors to the faithful and resumed its regular liturgical activities.
It was the first church to reopen after the earthquake.

The convent became the only stronghold of community in the area after the 2016 earthquake that struck the Umbrian-Marchigian Apennines.
When people had lost everything, only one thing remained intact: their faith. However, the monastery itself had been severely damaged and declared uninhabitable, forcing the nuns to relocate to a new, smaller ecclesiastical complex—a prefabricated structure built in front of the old one. It was a painful move for the Poor Clares, who had to leave behind a sacred place steeped in history and religious significance.

Drawn by this profound change, both structural and emotional, I decided to tell the story of a place that for centuries played a vital role in the life of the community and now lies abandoned, like a great animal mortally wounded.
I followed the sisters inside the old monastery, capturing them in spaces that, until recently, had been their home.