Not many of us in Ireland were aware that the recent floods in northern Italy have been actually quite significant. The devastation has been immense, yet it got pushed back in the Irish news behind other relevant local news. We were concerned about many good friends living in the Reggio Emilia area, amongst who are artist David Farrell and long life-and-work partner, his wife Gogo Della Luna. David had recently completed his relocation to Italy, bringing with him all his artworks and personal archive, and was stored alongside all the work from exhibitions they did together.

Only about a week ago we learnt that David's life work, including his analogue archive from the 'Innocent Landscapes' and other works, negatives, prints, and many other valuables have been lost to the flood. His work is fundamental in the understanding of a key period in Irish history and a cornerstone of the history of Photography in Ireland. This is a tragedy hard to put in words. Decades of work, and a record of Ireland's history, gone.

We have been speaking with Gogo over the last days to get an update on the situation. They have been working tirelessly to clear the mess the flood left behind, part of which was already collected by the municipality's trucks and sent to the landfill, with a lot of the artworks and negatives in them. Many of the negatives may have been well beyond recovery, but there remains a hope to rescue hundreds of others.

We decided to start this GoFundMe campaign so that we can all together chip in with whatever we can, support them in their efforts to rescue the remaining negatives, and to provide the equipment to do so.

Please, contribute with what you can and share it amongst your peers.

The funds will go directly to David and Gogo's bank account.