I met Vincenzo in Bastogi, on the outskirts of Rome. Dementia was slowly swallowing him, along with his memories, but only years before he walked above the crowd on stilts, transforming into devils and mythical creatures through his talent and imagination. His world had rapidly narrowed to a small apartment filled with fragments of an expansive life. Some days he seemed unreachable, lost in a dense fog; on others, a single photograph was enough to light up his eyes and see the performer resurface. The fog never truly disappeared. At times it would thin. Then it would return.
