Domiziano Maselli

The Milan-based audiovisual artist Domiziano Maselli, formerly part of the Eremo collective and the electroacoustic project Finnegan Tapes, launched his solo trajectory with Ashes in 2018, followed by Lazzaro (2021) and Themes/Soundscapes From Promesa (2022). In parallel, his practice expanded internationally, leading him to Reykjavík’s Greenhouse Studios, where he collaborated with Valgeir Sigurðsson and, more significantly, Ben Frost—for whom he also directed the video for “Tritium Bath” from Scope Neglect.

Frost’s presence looms large over Garden Of Kira (2026), shaping much of its sonic density and tactile intensity. 

There is no real stillness in Kira’s garden—at least, not for long.

“Amber” opens the record with percussive insistence, only to fracture under waves of distortion: two sonic planes colliding, grinding against each other until the tension becomes almost unbearable, before settling into a precarious, hard-won equilibrium. It’s a statement of intent—conflict as structure, erosion as form.

“The Garden Of Time” gestures toward the quasi-ritualistic atmospheres of Tim Hecker’s Konoyo and Anoyo, drawing from material that initially suggests meditation, yet gradually destabilizes into something far more restless. This internal duality—between suspension and rupture—runs throughout the album, especially in the pieces where Frost’s influence is most palpable.

That tension dissolves, or rather mutates, in “Kira”, the album’s most stripped-back moment: a sparse sequence of tones unfolding at a near-static pace, hovering over a backdrop that faintly evokes a sitar-like timbre. Around the five-minute mark, the piece opens unexpectedly, hinting at a fragile melodic contour—one of the few moments where the album allows itself a glimpse of emotional clarity.

“A Fire Hidden Behind The Bones” pushes back into denser territory, with pulsing electronics intertwined with Eastern-leaning tonalities, reinforcing the record’s sense of unease and instability. Sound here is never fixed—it flickers, shifts, resists containment.

The journey ultimately leads outward. “Something Mysterious Outside” closes the album with a bare field recording of cicadas: the only unequivocal sign of life appears beyond the garden’s boundaries, retroactively undermining its symbolic weight.

Is the garden a site of introspection, or a carefully constructed enclosure? A refuge, or a trap?

Maselli leaves the question open. Ambiguity and friction remain central to his language, and Garden Of Kira thrives precisely in that unresolved space—where sound becomes a field of tension rather than resolution.

29/04/2026