Distinta base (Bill of Materials)

A poetry collection by Elia Romanelli
With drawings by Marzia Migliora

Introduction by Elena Stancanelli
Translated by Clarissa Botsford
Designed and published by bruno
Book details

The book will be available at bruno’s stand at Offprint Paris 2026,
22–25 October | Césure

The official book launch will take place in Venice. The date will be announced shortly.

Distinta base is the first poetry collection by Elia Romanelli, a Venetian anthropologist, filmmaker, and writer.

Born out of the desire to bring together a carefully curated selection of poems written over the course of twenty-five years, the volume is a pocket-sized book with a mirror-image structure. On one side are the poems, through which Romanelli sets down what he knows of himself in an exercise in self-auscultation; on the other, revealed when the book is turned over, are the works of artist Marzia Migliora, which enter into dialogue with the texts, completing, questioning, or contradicting them.

The volume also features an introduction by writer and screenwriter Elena Stancanelli and an English translation by Clarissa Botsford. As Romanelli writes, “In words, I searched for all my bolts and springs, the quantities, the measurements, the millilitres, the screws, the nails. Not, of course, in the hope of achieving completeness, which would be impossible, but rather of tracing an outline and making it tangible, something that could be touched, even caressed.”