Fruits as Farmers Dream of Them in Winter
Photography exhibition by Gregor Božič

Opening 28.03. 2026 at 17.00
Until 10.05.2026
Open every day: 10-13 and 14.30-17.30

Museum SMO Slovensko Multimedialno Okno, San Pietro al Natisone/Špietar

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Over the past two years, many trees have sprouted between the villages of Topolò/Topoluove (Benečija) and Kojsko (Goriška Brda): many now wild in the woods, temporary clouds among the vigorous brambles, others well-pruned and lush. We have accompanied the tree through its seasons, from the abundance of summer to the silent winter, from the gestures of care to the harvest, seeking a way to prolong the life of its flavorful fruits. We have realized that it is not only the jams that help us in this endeavor, but the stories that feed these fruits—often still unripe or already fermented: stories of places, of departures, and of roots.

In this time of observation, harvesting, and experimentation, we have therefore grafted new stories, films, books, explorations, workshops, and a few recipes, to transcend the limits of the well-tended and well-planned orchard and help them grow vigorously, entering the forest—thorny, fertile with new inspirations and juicy fruits. But the time of the tree is a slow time, made of attempts and observation, which requires patience and perseverance, asks us to stay and resist and we are happy to do so.

This spring, we are planting a new orchard in the SMO Slovensko multimedialno okno museum, where Gregor Božič's photography exhibition Images de fruits rêvées par de vieux paysans en hiver (Fruits as Farmers Dream of Them in Winter) will be held. The exhibition, conceived during his studies at Le Fresnoy – Studio national des arts contemporains in France, began. Between December 2019 and February 2020, Gregor embarked on a journey to discover other places in Europe where ancient fruit growing resists the rationalization of production in the great global agri-food market. The journey took him to Italy (Sicily, Friuli), France (Ariège, Minervois, Lot-et-Garonne), Belgium (Sint-Truiden region), and back to the Collio area of ​​Gorizia.

The photographs, printed in September 2024 at Le Fresnoy on the occasion of the exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts in Tourcoing (MUba Eugène Leroy) and the Art Gallery of Carinthia (KGLU), will spend the spring in Benečija, at the Beneška Galerija.

The photography exhibition Sadeži, kot jih sanjajo sadjarji v zimskem času (Fruits as Farmers Dream of Them in Winter) portrays a journey through orchards, custodians of memories, and faces that speak of places where plants and bodies grow and endure. Trees are traces of a fragile human presence rooted in the earth that nourishes them.

In the poetic and at times dreamlike photographs of Gregor Božič—a director, photographer, and pomology enthusiast who grew up between Nova Gorica and the Collio—we recognize trees that are simultaneously mighty and fragile, like the faces that question them and the hands that tend them. Trees that endure on the earth that has nurtured them for years and that they, in turn, have nurtured, with the complicity of humanity, who has chosen not to be uprooted, not to uproot them, but to preserve their identity, their variety, and the delicate light that illuminates the stories that have blossomed around these plants.

Through photographs taken in the landscapes of France, Belgium, Sicily, and the Slovenian Collio, we dream of an orchard where we can take refuge from the summer heat, where the grass grows tall to become a bed and a hiding place, where in the evening the forest approaches to taste the early fruit, and in the morning we interrogate the traces of these visits. The trees become swings and handholds to reach the ripest fruit, pedestals to tell stories. There, at the top of their foliage, we find the flavor we were seeking, the fruit that has labored so hard to ripen and will, heedlessly, fall to the ground in a few days if a bird doesn't peck at it first.

Gregor Božič is a director, cinematographer, and researcher of Mediterranean pomology. He studied film and cinematography at the AGRFT Film and Television School in Ljubljana and the DFFB Film School in Berlin, and contemporary visual arts at Le Fresnoy National Studio in Lille.

In Benečija, he collected grafts to graft them into the orchard of ancient varieties from Brda (Centre for Fruit Culture) he manages in Kojsko (Goriška Brda). He also shot the short film Šuolni iz Trsta (2014) and the feature film Zgodbe iz kostanjevih gozdov (2019).

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The exhibition was realised the support of the Autonomous Region of Friuli Venezia Giulia (Sadna krajina project, Regional Law no. 26/2007, art. 22, paragraph 3) and the European Union (Fund for small projects GO! 2025 of the Interreg VI-A ItaliaSlovenia 2021-2027 Programme, managed by the GECT GO, Uncommon Fruits project)