Articles by: Natasha Lardera

An itinerant exhibition strongly desired by the Fondazione Italiana per la Legalità e lo Sviluppo "Generale CC Ignazio Milillo" (Italian Foundation for Legality and Development "General of the Carabinieri Army Ignazio Milillo"), composed by pictures referring to key and dramatic mafia-related events and to unforgettable victories of the State against the mafia, is on view at the Italian Cultural Institute. 

“I was born in a police station. I have always lived in the barracks and I served in the Carabinieri
Corps up to the rank of General. In 1963 I was 10 years old and lived in Palermo. My father, the Lieutenant Colonel, used to command the external group of the Carabinieri in Palermo...” The person speaking is General Giuseppe Fausto Milillo, the son of Gen. Ignazio Milillo, an important figure in the fight against the mafia, who is at the head of the Italian Foundation for Legality and Development "General of the Carabinieri Army Ignazio Milillo.

Can you please explain the title of this photographic testimony.

“Luci dal Buio. Mafia e Antimafia” (Lights from the Dark. Mafia and Antimafia: pictures for an inventory) is the title that we picked because, we want, right from the start, simply by leafing through the catalogue or by looking at the pictures, to convey the message that there is always a ray of sunshine, space for hope and for new beginnings, and that Good always wins against Evil. Right from the start people must understand that with the implementation of a Cultura della Legalità (Culture of Legality), key point of all operative activities of the Foundation, the mafia and any other criminal organizations will have a hard time in coming together and in operating in that social, economic and political context.  

Would you point out a couple of pictures that are particularly significant.

The Fondazione Italiana per la Legalità e lo Sviluppo is named after the “Generale dei Carabinieri Ignazio Milillo” who

- In 1949, while he was a lieutenant in Palermo, was hurt during the famous and tragic attack known as the “Strage di Bellolampo” by the bandit Salvatore Giuliano; 
 

- On May 14, 1964, after lengthy investigations with the Polizia Giudiziaria, arrested the mafia boss Luciano Liggio, aka the Primula Rossa di Corleone, after sixteen years as a fugitive. Luciano Liggio was the undisputed Mafia boss at the time and his arrest was the first historical action that the State took against the Mafia. For that reason we are particularly proud of showing a picture portraying his arrest. Liggio is in his bed at the moment of his capture. The man in uniform is the Gen. Ignazio Milillo, at the time Colonel in command of the Gruppo Esterno Carabinieri of Palermo.
 

The other two pictures that are particularly meaningful are that of the arrest, by the Polizia di Stato, of Bernardo Provenzano, and the portrait of Joe Petrosino, the first, well known victim of the criminal organization. If we were to give a common meaning to these three images, we could say that no homicide, or any other criminal action, wanted by the mafia remains unpunished. Even the most powerful criminals, assassins and mafia bosses see their power disintegrate and they are either killed or arrested.

Your foundation has several purposes - the disclosure, retention and promotion of the fight against the Mafia; training the new generations in the rediscovery of historical memories; and the promotion of activities aimed at preserving and enhancing the civilization and culture of Sicily's legal philosophy -  this exhibition seems to satisfy them all, is that so?

The Foundation's goals are well known and this photographic testimony represents them all.  

The importance of this collection of photographs is due to the fact that historical memories must  be revisited with a social purpose. Nobody should forget what happened in the past as that helps the present's sense of freedom and respect for humanity.

I want to use the words of Italian Ambassador in the US, Claudio Bisogniero, who, in the letter he sent me, has shown appreciation for the tireless work of the Foundation. “The fight against the mafia is not simply colliding with organized crime, there is more.

We can win only by teaching legality and instill it in the hearts and minds of the younger generation. We win only by keeping alive the memory of all the sorrow and pain inflicted by the mafia  cancer and of all the country's victories against it...so we don't only bring the mafia into the shadows but we bring our anti-mafia successes into the light.” We help the light shine stronger as we are there teaching all future generations the importance of legality. 

What's the importance of bringing this exhibition to the US?

Bringing this photographic testimony to New York is extremely important because it's an opportunity to further denounce the operational-criminal link and the infiltration by the mafia that both Italy and the United States have experienced since forever. The Foundation is always busy in spreading a Culture of Legality and that's why we use the show, which is almost at the end of its tour, to communicate our Credo even overseas, in that Italian-American axis, that has always been afflicted by the Mafia.  Let's not forget that among the pictures exposed there is the aforementioned one of Joe Petrosino, and that of the mafia boss Tommaso Buscetta, also known as the boss of two worlds, because he was at the head of the mafia connection in both Italy and the USA. 

What should the American people know about Ge. Milillo? 

The American people are wonderful as they have been able to grow with great respect for Freedom and Democracy, fighting against terrorism and organized crime. They have live through great sacrifices with great respect for culture and memory... that's why they can comprehend and cherish the work and the high feelings of loyalty to the state that motivated Gen. Ignazio Milillo. A man like so many in his simplicity and humility. A military man among many, who, proud and influential, lived his Credo and his life with the utmost respect for human beings, society and the Law, and who fought against every form of criminal activity and the mafia.

Giulio Turcato's drawings were never a focus of his three past solo shows in the United States in the 1970s and 1980s, therefore this exhibition at Casa Italiana Zerilli-Marimò is the first to bring together a wide selection, about  40, of the artist's works on paper to the United States. “It is not, however, the first time that Turcato set foot in the country,” his granddaughter, Martina Caruso, has said.

 Indeed back in 1962, the artist from Mantua visited, for a two week period of time, New York  City and, as any other tourist, saw the city and some friends, including Salvatore Scarpitta, a local artist born to a Sicilian father and Polish-Russian mother best known for his sculptural studies of motion, who was part of the artistic and intellectual circles they both hung out at in Rome.

To know more about Turcato let's go back in time, to January 24, 1995 and the obituary written by The New York Times.

“Giulio Turcato, a painter and sculptor who was a prominent member of Italy's postwar avant-garde, died on Sunday at his home in Rome. He was 82. Mr. Turcato, who was born in Mantua in 1912, studied and then taught art in Venice. In 1943, he settled in Rome, where he took part in the anti-Fascist underground. After the war, he was part of a group of artists who in 1948 signed a manifesto proclaiming themselves "formalists and Marxists," clashing with Italian Communist Party officials who contended art should be realistic. Blending aspects of Picasso and Futurism, he developed a nongeometric style of abstraction for which he claimed political subject matter primarily through titles like "Revolts," "Political Gatherings," "Factories" and "Mines." In the 1950's, Mr. Turcato was attracted to a more gestural, atmospheric form of abstractions and was allied with a group of painters that included Afro, Emilio Vedova and Giuseppe Santomasso. In the 1960's, he grew more experimental with form and technique, including painting on foam rubber. Mr. Turcato won the National Prize at the 1958 Venice Biennale, and was the subject of a retrospective at the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna in Rome in 1987. Last fall, his work was included in "The Italian Metamorphosis: 1943-1968," which closed on Sunday at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in Manhattan.” In fact the Guggenheim show closed only a few days before his death.

“New York was, like his trip to China in 1956, a life changing experience,” Martina Caruso stated in “Giulio Turcato, a gentle anarchist,”which would have a strong impact on Turcato's vision and further experiments with different materials. For instance with Ricordo di New Work (Remembering New York) from 1963 the artist explores the use of carbon copy paper in a new dimension.” When you look closely at the piece of art you would indeed realize that the carbon copy paper is used to signify the elements of light and darkness of this city. Among the other drawings directly inspired by the city we find New York, from 1964, tempera and ballpoint pen on colored paper, which captures the exterior of a few buildings and looks like a predecessor of the Big Apple's skyline postcards tourists have been sending home for decades.

During the post-war period, in the 1940s and 1950s, the artist appears to have preferred working on canvas rather than paper. Only six out of the 43 drawings exhibited at Casa Italiana are dated pre-1960 and two of these are sketches for larger painted works: Giardino di Miciurin (Garden of Michurin) and the blue, white and black Composizione (Composition) from 1954 – 55.

There are a few pieces featuring money (FLASH ART, 1975, is a collage on cardboard that features a $100 bill) and money is something that was on the artist's mind, as it seemed that everything always went back to the material, to cash... The show is an explosion of colors and forms and a testimony of his expressions and thoughts and a welcome back to the artist's beloved city.

“What makes this production of Six Passionate Women special are the actors,” playwright Mario Fratti explains to i-italy as his award winning play is being performed at the Theater for the New City. “This time we picked veterans hailing from Broadway who are able to get to know the characters better. The quality of acting is higher, more professional.”

And the actors Fratti is talking about are Dennis Parlato, in the role of Nino (“A Chorus Line,” “Sound of Music); Donna Vivino (“Les Miserables”); Ellen Barber (“Fame”); Colleen Sexton (“Jekyll and Hyde), Line Rettmer, Carlotta Brentan and Giulia Bisinella.

“When I am preparing a show I always follow the same method,” Fratti explained. “I chose the actor and then I let them “play with the play.” I let them get to know each other and get familiar with the text. I basically set them free, they can do whatever they want... until the last week of rehearsal. That's when I go in, see what they've come up with and correct all the mistakes. I don't want to disturb but I also want to have my say.”

Nevertheless, Fratti is not the director of the show, he's the playwright, the director is Stephan Morrow, and he wrote Six Passionate Women inspired by his personal acquaintance with Federico Fellini, whom he covered closely as a journalist in the 1950s.

Nino is an Italian filmmaker who is facing an artistic crisis. “Every new work is, for him, an artistic crisis. So he goes to bed with a multitude of women, seeking ideas and stimulation, feeding on them both humanly and artistically. Nino is sexually impotent until he gets a good idea, and then he's hellfire. But his sexual partners all artists in their own right, are not satisfied. Rallied by a wealthy feminist American widow, they decide that to be a muse is to be exploited. So they get revenge by making a movie on Nino's life and fantasies, Candid-Camera style.”

“I always say, and there is a line in the play that says so, that a man needs many women,” Fratti confessed, “He needs a mother, a sister, a daughter and a lover.” Only one lover? “Let's say only one,” he joked. “There is a lot in the play that is autobiographic, but I would not point it out.”

Fratti has indeed admitted that the play is all Fellini but there's a measure of autobiography with every playwright. Between 1957 and 1959, working as a journalist, he covered Fellini's rehearsals and observed his relationships with his actors, including the palpable measure of hostility and resentment there. “This is where I got my idea of writing a revenge play, in which a group of women who feel exploited rise up against this director figure. They are in juxtaposition with the director's co-writer, a man, who also is deserving of revenge but he is unable to act upon it. In my plays women most often prevail in the battle of the sexes.”

“The women of this play,” director Stephan Morrow said, “remind me of “Les Liasons Dangereuses.” They're all going for the jugular – they are the new aristocracy – but without the shadow of the guillotine in the background.”

“These women are passionate,” Fratti added “The word passionate comes from the Latin verb patire, which means to suffer. The point is strongly made that creation is always a group effort, that creativity an sexual potency are closely linked in the creative process and that Fellini's genius was completely dependent upon preying on the women around him. In this production, the women rise up against this type of creative misappropriation.”

Fellini and Six Passionate Women, were the inspiration of another work by Fratti, an adaptation of the film 8 ½, that evolved into the Broadway musical Nine (winner of five Tony Awards and eight Drama Desk awards). Book by Mario Fratti, music and lyrics by Maury Yeston, Nine was in the works for almost seven years. “Ed Kleban (A Chorus Line) saw Six Passionate Women at the Actor's Studio and suggested a musical. He introduced me to young Yeston and we decided to work together on the musical “Nights with Guido.” I chose the name Guido Contini, and he was enthusiastic about the fact that the name I invented was a combination of Visconti and Fellini. We were rejected by many producers, and we went through many rewrites but in the end we made it.”

The world-renowned organization La MaMa Experimental Theatre has hosted the Sara Galas Band for the performance of Unmeasurable Picture, an interdisciplinary performance of original music, poetry and lyrical imagery. 

Formed by Italian actor, singer songwriter Sara Galassini and Japanese composer and multi
instrumentalist Yukio Tsuji, the Sara Galas Band is a dynamic Duo whose eclectic sound takes root in the tradition of Italian music but creates rhythmic and melodic motifs that belong to world, jazz, rock, reggae, bossa nova, tango, flamenco and folk music. 
 

Actor, singer songwriter Sara Galassini launched her career in NYC as a member of La MaMa ETC in 2000. Arriving from Siena, Italy, by the invitation of Ellen Stewart, Sara has developed her creative talent and musical sensibility by collaborating with award winning Japanese composer and multi-instrumentalist Yukio Tsuji. 
 

Mr. Tsuji’s wide expertise in composition and variety of sound hails from Asia, Europe and America. Tsuji’s well-known mastery of percussion, shakuhachi and guitar can been heard on countless film soundtracks, modern dance, concerts and theater productions.
 

The duo’s songs focus on the human condition through lyrical story telling of dreams, hope, love, mythical and archetypal figures and the miracles of life. Tsuji’s acoustic arrangements underscore Galassini’s poetic lyrics in Italian and English with sheer inventiveness and simplicity resonating a distinct spiritual force that is strongly present in Galassini’s words and an alchemical energy ever present between the two musicians. 
 

In NYC the Sara Galas Bandhas performed shows in Lounges and Theaters, among which are Japan Society, La MaMa ETC, Dixon Place, The Nuyorican Poets Café, M.E.A.N.Y Fest 2013, the Great Hall at Cooper Square, and they continue to do so.
 

This brigs us to their latest show: Unmeasurable Picture.

Conceived and written by Galassini and composed in collaboration with Tsuji, Unmeasurable Picture aims to theatrically portray today's dynamic and troubled society and spread a message of unity and solidarity. The piece portrays a woman (Sara Galassini) in today’s troubled world, on the journey for self-discovery. The non-linear narrative of the show unfolds in a series of dream-like music-based scenes. 
 

In the show the Sara Galas Band and its collaborators, drummer Bill Ruyle, pianist and mandoline player Claudio Scarabottini, bass player Yuka Tadano and well known flamenco dancer Maria Elena Anaya from Mexico, explore the inconsistency and oppositions of human behavior. The dualities of human nature that can make life and love blossom or slowly die and vanish. 
 

But let's find out more about the show and what's behind it. Sara Galassini has answered some of our questions and explained why "We are never alone but part of a bigger, if not Unmeasurable Picture." 

How did Unmeasurable Picture come to be?

Unmeasurable Picture comes from the musical collaboration between me, a Tuscan actress and singer-songwriter , and the Japanese composer and multi-instrumentalist Yukio Tsuji. Back in 2012 the we founded, in NYC, the Sara Galas Band, a duo featuring the sound of a guitar and of Sara's voice, that plays original songs in both Italian and English. Both Tsuji and I have plenty of experience in the world of theater and so we decided to experiment with the theatrics of their music. This is how Unmeasurable Picture came to be. We use pieces of our repertoire to tell about a voyage, the journey of an everyday woman who is looking to find herself... to find her true identity and spirituality in a world where beings are falling apart more and more.

Why is it important to convey a universal message of unity and solidarity? 

Equality, solidarity and unity are core topics of my compositions. They are fundamental values of human existence, but oftentimes they seem to be ignored by society and by modern governments that tend to separate humanity between the rich and the poor, the weak and the powerful, the rightful and the wrongful.  And so the modern man lives in conflict, in inequality, in corruption and opportunism... appearances matter more than authenticity and fundamental moral values are totally ignored. I see music, poetry and theater as a vehicle to go back to these values and to a common identity that lies in nature, love and sharing.

How would you describe the journey of the protagonist?

This woman's journey is almost imaginary: it's interior, spiritual. It lies between consciousness and subconsciousness where reality blends with intuition and imagination merges with dreams. Loss and neglect become almost necessary in order to meet and rediscover part of the whole that surrounds us. In the journey of life we are constantly tested and forced to face new possibilities and experiences. This helps our personal inner growth.

Tell me about the multiculturalism of the theater.

By living in NYC I've had the constant possibility to witness other cultures and traditions. This experience helped me understand how important it is to share our own individuality, to welcome diversity as new treasure to share in order to discover a possible common fate of peace among the nations of the earth. Sara Galas Band's choice to collaborate with artists form Europe, Asia, the US and Mexico is a deliberate choice aiming at spreading a message of solidarity, equality and sharing.

Why is it important to see this show?

Seeing Unmeasurable Picture is important because it is a project that speaks to everybody. It touches the universal values of respect, equality and acceptance giving them the role of key players in the creation of a just society where solid and everlasting peace reigns for all.