Art from the Fascism Era

The art and architecture are influenced by the dominating ideologies of their times. The rise of fascist ideologies in Italy during 1920s and 30s, had influenced the art and architecture from that period.

Recently, I had an opportunity to visit an exhibition on this theme at MART museum in Rovereto (Italy). The image below shows the sculpture of a man at the exhibition entrance.

In this post, I want to share about some exhibits from this exhibition. There were hundreds of art-works including paintings, sculptures, posters, photographs and models in this exhibition. For convenience, I have sub-divided a few examples of those in 3 groups - influence of fascism on the arts, representations of Mussolini and the end of fascism.

You can click on the images of this post for a bigger view.

Art from the Fascist Era or the Fascist Art?

Some artists believe in the ideology and thus, their creative expressions are aligned with the ideals of that era. Other artists may not believe in the ideology but can be forced to follow the dominant dictates of that ideology.

In the second group, sometimes, artists' dissent against the dominant ideology may be expressed in hidden symbols or clever subversions of ideas. The image below shows posters about fascism from 1920s & 30s.

Fascist Ideology & Its Artistic Influences

Fascism means glorification of masculine virtues - tall, broad, strong, powerful and patriotic alpha males with square jaws, leading their families, communities and the country, to compete against, fight and dominate the men from other communities and countries, for the glory of their fatherland.

Women play a supporting role in this process, they are supposed to reproduce children, look after their families and communities, and admire their handsome men. (The image below has a sculpture of the war veteran and fascist leader Carlo Delacroix by the sculptor Antonio G. Santagata in 1928)

I had no idea about the impact of fascist ideology on the arts and thus, I was very curious to visit this exhibition. My friend Giorgio loves art and when he proposed that we go to Rovereto to see it, I immediately agreed.

The term "Fascism" comes from Fascia or Fascio, a covering or a band. For example, fascias can be the cords tying together bundles of grain-stalks. For this reason, often paintings from that era show bundles of grain-stalks tied together by the fascia. This term expressed the strength of being united.  Image below has a painting from this exhibition, showing bundles of grain-stalks.

Evolution of Fascism in Italy

The ideas of "Revolutionary Fascism" were launched after the end of second world war by the 34 years old Benito Mussolini around 1917. Five years later, in 1922, the king of Italy appointed the 39 years old Mussolini as the prime minister.

In 1925, Giovanni Gentile, the philosopher and the ideologue of fascism, launched the Manifesto of Revolutionary Fascism at Palazzo Fava in Bologna (that building today hosts a medieval museum).

Initially, the fascist ideology developed as secular, but over the 1930s, Mussolini developed closer links with the Catholic church. During 1930s, Mussolini also became closer to Hitler and Nazism, and the racial segregation laws targeting the Jews were enacted in 1938.

In 1943, the arrival of British-American allied forces in south Italy led to German occupation of remaining Italy and the conclusion of the fascism. Partisans killed Giovanni Gentile in 1944 and Mussolini was lynched in April 1945.

With this introduction, now let me come to some examples of the exhibits.

Artworks in the Exhibition: Influence of Fascism on Art During 1920s and 1930s

Fascist ideals of women and children were expressed through creation of specific movements with their black costumes, songs and parades. For example, the children were organised in the Ballila groups for physical and moral education. Ceramic statues from 1930s from the ceramic factories of Nove-Bassano and the statues by Elena Konig, shown below, represent these.

Designs made by the artist Achille Funi during 1930s for making frescoes in official buildings also show the influence of fascism (image below). Funi is credited with the Novecento art movement during 1920s and for bringing back fresco mural-paintings into vogue.

Mario Sironi was another artist, part of the Novecento movement, who worked on fresco mural-paintings. The image below, shows his works "the horse-rider" from 1934, illustrating men and horses, another favourite theme of fascism.

Italian futurism art movement had started in early 20th century, before the first world war. During late 1920s and 1930s, a second futurism-art movement came around, which was heavily influenced by fascism. The two images below show some examples of this phase of futurism-art.

 

This was the biggest section of the exhibition.

Artworks in the Exhibition: Art About Benito Mussolini

Mussolini as the supreme leader of fascism, was often represented in paintings and sculpture. As an icon of fascism, these representations often showed him as fighter and warrior, with square jaws, frowning brows and a scowl or even injured in a fist fight. Below you can see some examples of these icons.

Artworks in the Exhibition: Art About the End of Fascism

In 1943, the arrival of allied forces in south Italy signalled the end of  fascism and artists could finally express themselves openly. For example, the 1943 painting by Mino Maccari shows the end awaiting Mussolini.

In 1945, at the end of the second world war, Benito Mussolini was lynched and angry mobs had brought down his statues and broken them. One such bust of Mussolini, which had been created by sculptor Adolf Wildt in 1923, and was broken with hammers by an angry mob in 1945, illustrates that time (image below).

India in the Exhibition

The fascism-art exhibition also had a 1942 painting by Italian artist Adalberto Libera titled "The Ataturk Monument in Ankara", shown in the image below. It has a column of fire in the middle and round walls all around with the Sanskrit words "Vande Matram" written in Roman alphabet.

Libera is known primarily as an architect. I don't think that the painting shows the Ataturk monument, rather it shows India's independence struggle against the British, which might have been seen positively by the fascist regime. I don't know if Libera had by mistake added the Sanskrit words to his Ataturk painting or if the exhibition organisers have mistaken the painting-title.

In Conclusion

This exhibition on art from the fascism era was curated by the well-known Italian art historian, critic and author Vittorio Sgarbi. He is known for his abusive and polemical TV-show persona and I don't like watching him, but I liked the way he has curated this exhibition.

At the end I am haunted by the broken statue of Mussolini. It reminded me of images of statues of Lenin and Saddam Hussein being brought down by mobs. In this sense, history keeps on repeating itself - sooner or later, the dictators and the strongmen become prisoners of their own images and are unable to confront the reality in time, to stop themselves from the final inevitable showdown.

Let me conclude this post with another image from this exhibition - a 1939 painting by Cesare Maggi titled "Listening to the Duce's radio broadcast".

I think that the above painting is about the declaration of Italy joining Germany in the war. Most persons in the painting look sombre and are dressed in black, the colour of the fascists. I am intrigued by the man in the red shirt standing in the centre, who has military medals pinned on his shirt. Was that red colour used by the artist to give a strong focal point in the painting or was it a sign towards the role played by Italian partisans in the war, who had fought against the Mussolini regime? The hill in the background seems like San Luca in Bologna, which had a large network of partisans.

May be Maggi, usually known as an artist close to the fascist regime, was actually trying to express his dissent through this painting?

Perhaps a similar argument can be made about some of the busts of Mussolini, which seem to caricature a strongman persona?

***

Power of Our Geographies

Guided by self-interest, all countries seek power, leverage and resources. In this, a country's geography is like a prison, because its limits and constraints are difficult to overcome. This is the basic premise of Tim Marshall as he looks at the geographies, histories and challenges of ten areas of the world in his 2015 book, "Prisoners of Geography - Ten Maps that tell Everything You Need to Know About Global Politics". 

I have just finished reading this book and I found its conclusions very harsh, sometimes even heart-breaking. At the same time, I found it stimulating and thought-provoking.

We live in utopian times - even with the wars and climate change and loss of bio-diversity, I somehow feel that with our new knowledge, understandings and innovations, the humanity will find a way to a better tomorrow. I dream that our future world will be guided by ideals of peace, brotherhood and mutual collaboration between countries and peoples. Marshall says that this utopian dream may remain just a dream, because countries and peoples are guided by their self-interests and they can't escape their geographies.

Geographical Areas Covered in the Book

The book looks at geographies and histories of ten areas - Russia, China, USA, Western Europe, Africa, Middle East, India & Pakistan, Korea & Japan, Latin America and the Arctic. For each of these areas, Marshall provides an overview of its geographical layout and history, especially the evolution of its relationships with its neighbours.

He says that the relationships between countries are dominated by the ancient ideas of suspicion, self-interest and gaining control over resources. Countries and their governments might talk of brotherhood and collaboration but they never forget those ancient ideas and when needed, go to war over them.

For example, in the part about the geography of Russia, he writes:

"Poland represents a relatively narrow corridor into which Russia could drive its armed forces if necessary and thus prevent an enemy from advancing towards Moscow. But from this point the wedge begins to broaden; by the time you get to Russia’s borders it is over 2,000 miles wide, and is flat all the way to Moscow and beyond ... You might think that no one is intent on invading Russia, but that is not how the Russians see it, and with good reason. In the past 500 years they have been invaded several times from the west."

There are different wars in the world-history, described in Marshall's book, that I was unaware of, and thus it was very instructive to read this book. For example, I was not aware of the history of the Kurds. Here is a part about it, in the section on the Middle East (p. 256):

"Kurdistan is not a sovereign recognised state but it has many of the trappings of one, and current events in the Middle East only add to the probability that there will be a Kurdistan in name and in international law. The questions are: what shape will it be? And how will Syria, Turkey and Iran react if their Kurdish regions attempt to be part of it and try to create a contiguous Kurdistan with access to the Mediterranean?

There will be another problem: unity among the Kurds. Iraqi Kurdistan has long been divided between two rival families. Syria’s Kurds are trying to create a statelet they call Rojava ... If Kurdistan does become an internationally recognised state then the shape of Iraq will change. That assumes there will be an Iraq. There may not be."

His descriptions of the fissures in the Middle East are the most hard-hitting and pessimist part of the book. For example, he writes about Islamism and Palestinian refugees (p. 259), "Such changes to a country’s demographics can cause serious problems, and nowhere more so than in Lebanon." Another example, is in the following extract about the future of the "Arab Spring":

"In the Middle East power does indeed flow from the barrel of a gun. Some good citizens of Misrata in Libya may want to develop a liberal democratic party, some might even want to campaign for gay rights; but their choice will be limited if the local de facto power shoots liberal democrats and gays. Iraq is a case in point: a democracy in name only, far from liberal, and a place where people are routinely murdered for being homosexual.

The second phase of the Arab uprising is well into its stride. This is the complex internal struggle within societies where religious beliefs, social mores, tribal links and guns are currently far more powerful forces than ‘Western’ ideals of equality, freedom of expression and universal suffrage. The Arab countries are beset by prejudices, indeed hatreds of which the average Westerner knows so little that they tend not to believe them even if they are laid out in print before their eyes. We are aware of our own prejudices, which are legion, but often seem to turn a blind eye to those in the Middle East.

The routine expression of hatred for others is so common in the Arab world that it barely draws comment other than from the region’s often Western-educated liberal minority who have limited access to the platform of mass media."

In Conclusion

The book ends on a pessimistic note and is brutal about our prospects for a more peaceful world, at least in the immediate future:

"As the twenty-first century progresses, the geographical factors that have helped determine our history will mostly continue to determine our future: a century from now, Russia will still be looking anxiously westward across what will remain flatland. India and China will still be separated by the Himalayas. They may eventually come into conflict with each other, but if that does happen, then geography will determine the nature of the fight ... Of course geography does not dictate the course of all events. Great ideas and great leaders are part of the push and pull of history. But they must all operate within the confines of geography. The leaders of Bangladesh might dream of preventing the waters from flooding up the Bay of Bengal, but they know that 80 per cent of the country is on a flood plain and cannot be moved. It is a point the Scandinavian and English leader King Canute made to his sycophantic courtiers in the eleventh century, when ordering the waves to retreat: nature, or God, was greater than any man. In Bangladesh all that can be done is to react to the realities of nature: build more flood defences, and hope that the computer modelling of rising waters due to global warming is overstated."

This book was written in 2015 and some of its worries about possible conflicts (such as Russia - Ukraine, Israel - Palestine, north and south Sudan, D.R. of Congo) have become realities.

If you are interested in geopolitics and want a deeper understanding about our past, on-going and potential future conflicts and challenges, do read this book.

*****

War Cemeteries of Vicentino

The First World War was fought between the Austrian-Hungarian empire on the east and the rest of the Europe (and USA) on the west, between 1914-1918.

The tiny town of Schio in north-east part of Italy, where I live, is a part of the Vicentino area around the historical town of Vicenza, and is marked by the little Dolomite mountains of the Alps. Some of the most furious battles of that war were fought in these mountains.

There are three major war monument-cemeteries (known as Sacrario) on these mountains - on Pasubio mountain, on the Altopiano of Asiago and on the Grappa mountain. (In the image below - a view of the top of Grappa Sacrario)

Recently, our local book-readers' group decided to visit the war-sites described in a book about the first world war, that we had read. The book written by Paolo Malaguti was titled "Moro della Cima"  (Moro of the mountain top), and it told the story of a man called Moro who used to live at the top of the Grappa mountain and had played a role in the battles around that area.

This post is a result of this visit to the Grappa mountain, at around 1,800 meters, and it briefly presents the three mountain cemeteries.

The Sacrario-Cemeteries

All the towns in this part of the north-east of Italy have their first World War cemeteries, with the tombs of the local boys who had died in that war.

However, around 20 million soldiers had died in that war, thousands of bodies had been lost and many soldiers had not been identified. After the end of the war, for some of them, Sacrarios (sacred monuments) were built in which the remains of a lot of soldiers were put all together.

The Sacrario of Grappa Mountain

The Grappa mountain looms over the town of Bassano. In the battles of Grappa, around half-a-million guys had died and another half-a-million had ended with disabilities. All towns and villages around Grappa have their local monuments to remember those guys and almost every family have relatives who had taken part in that war.

The biggest cemetery is the Sacrario monument at the top of the mountain with thousands of tombs. The monument is divided into two parts - on one side are the Italians and on the other side, are the Austrian-Hungarian tombs.

At the top, connecting the two sides, there is a wide-strip of land, from where you can look down at the mountain-slopes. Underneath the monument is a few kilometers long gallery, part of which can be visited, which had a hospital, dining mess and spaces for firing artillery fire on the enemy soldiers.

In the Austrian-Hungarian part of the cemetery, there is a tomb of a young boy, which has become a pilgrimage site and is often cited during the calls for peace and against the wars. It is called the tomb of Peter Pan. The blond angelic looking boy's body was found in September 1918 and the Italian soldiers who found him gave him the name, Peter Pan. Later his real identify was discovered, he was from a Hungarian village, which is now part of Romania. People place flowers, sea-shells and stones on his tomb.

Sacrario of Asiago

Asiago is a part of seven municipalities spread over the high-plains of Vicentino region. German-speaking Cimbrian people from the Bavarian region of Germany had settled here. It is a well-known tourist place known for its beautiful mountains, lakes and skiing slopes.

The Sacrario monument of Asiago is a huge construction in the form of an arch at the top of a hill.

Sacrario of Pasubio

Pasubio mountain (2,232 meters) looms above Schio, where I live. The mountain pass called Pian delle Fugazze at 1,163 meters, beneath the Pasubio mountain, holds another Sacrario, which I can see from our back-terrace.

The Sacrario looks down from a panoramic point at the Leogra valley and its towns - Sant'Antonio, Valli del Pasubio and Schio.

A short distance below the sacrario, around the edge of the mountains is an old fort (Forte Maso), which was also a site of a furious battle. Walking around Pasubio, one can see smaller monuments remembering specific battles and their soldiers.

Other First World War Buildings

Scattered across these mountains, there are numerous ruins of old buildings, artillery sites, tunnels and caves which were used during the different battles.

One of my favourite such sites is located at a place near Tonezza del Cimone, not far from Schio, with the ruins of bunkers of the Austrian soldiers on a mountain-side. (In the image below)

It is such a beautiful place with wonderful views of the surrounding valleys. To think of the war, bombs and people dying in that place, makes me feel very sad, and I cam imagine the lives of those soldiers.

In Conclusion

Let me conclude this post with a picture of some of our book-readers' group-members from the Sacrario of Grappa mountain.

It was a beautiful visit to the top of Grappa mountains. Being together with our book-loving friends was great. Thinking of the world war history and the book we had read, made that history and those events come alive.

These cemeteries have tombs of soldiers from all over Europe, including from UK and USA. The well-known American writer Ernest Hemingway had been an ambulance driver in Schio during that war in 1918. Thus, these sites are pilgrimage places for the families of those soldiers from different countries.

A big thank you to Michela, our readers'-group coordinator, and to Mirko, who was our guide for this visit.

***

#grappa #warcemeteries #firstworldwar #northeastitaly #bookreaders #schiocultura

Red Riding Hood Exhibition

Red Riding Hood is a familiar and much loved fable for children about a little girl and a big bad wolf. At the same time, it hints at the dangers of dangerous encounters for children. Recently I visited an exhibition about the little Red Riding Hood (Cappuccetto Rosso) in Schio (Vicenza, Italy).

This post talks about the life-long passion of two women, Paola & Ivana, about this fable, which led them to collect books, dolls, puppets and other rare objects on this theme from different parts of the world. At the same time, the post looks at how the story of this fable has evolved over the centuries.

The Little Red Riding Hood Exhibition

This exhibition was held at the historical Palazzo Toaldi Capra in Schio in April 2024. The exhibition poster was based on illustrations made by the high-school kids of Schio. Younger children had helped in preparing the red and black boxes used for displaying some of the exhibits.

The image below shows the illustrations by the students of Arturo Martini Arts School, which were used for making the poster.

The exhibition included a large number of books in different languages about Red Riding Hood, including books with paper-art and those with exquisite illustrations, some of them very old. Parents accompanying small children were encouraged to sit down and go through some of the books.

Children could also play with the dolls and the puppets including the glove-puppets. The special exhibits included the grand-mother's bed, a mobile wood-cut scene of the fable and, a special doll is which can transform the girl into the grandmother and then into a wolf.

People Behind the Exhibition (and the collection)

The collection used for the exhibition is the result of a life-long passion of two women, friends and neighbours, from Schio - Paola Gandini and Ivana Organo (image below).

I spoke to Paola about it. She said that Ivana had become her neighbour some forty years ago when, newly married, she had come to live next door. Both had developed this passion for collecting stuff related to Cappuccetto Rosso (literally "red hood" in Italian). Most of the stuff was bought from antiquarian markets.

Some years ago, they found that Emilia Romagna region in Italy had organised a book exhibition on this theme. Since they had so much more stuff about this theme, and not just books, they also decided to organise something. Their first exhibition one was in San Leguzzano, not very far from Schio, during their Museum Night event. Since then it has been organised in different towns, especially in collaboration with local civic libraries and schools. The present exhibition in Schio has been organised with the local Comune office, the Colore del Grano children's bookshop and the civic library, as a part of the Schio che Legge (Schio Reads) initiative.

Paola said that everytime it has been a different exhibition since they need to adapt to the space they get in each site. Their collection is very big and usually the space is limited, so they need to decide what to share. For example, in one of the exhibitions, they also had a tunnel representing wolf's tummy, in which children could enter.

For her, the exhibition object which is closest to her heart is a handmade book on this theme made for her by her daughter.

Fable of Red Riding Hood

Some panels in the exhibition illustrate how the fable changed and evolved during the centuries. According to the French researcher Paul Delarue, this story was known from older times and in many versions. In those earlier stories the girl did not have the red hood and showed courage in escaping from the wolf.

For example, in one version, she tells the wolf that she needs to pee and so the wolf ties a red-ribbon to her leg and allows her to go out. Once out, she opens the ribbon, ties it to a tree and runs away.

In the written version from 1697 called Le Petit Chaperon Rouge, by Charles Perrault in France, the story did not have a happy ending - in the end the wolf ate the girl.

The most well-known version is the one from 19th century by the Grimm brothers in which they had introduced the figure of the hunter (sometimes replaced by a wood-cutter) who kills the wolf in the end and saves the girl and her grandmother.

Fable As a Warning for Children

As parents we are faced with two opposite needs - the need to help our children grow up as friendly and open persons, who love and respect nature; and the need to protect them from the violence, especially sexual violence of predatory grown-ups.

The wolf in the story represents danger. The fable can be used to talk about inappropriate touch and dangers of grown-ups who approach and lure minors, and exploit them.

 At the same time, we also need to talk about wolfs in nature, who are an important part of our wild-life and who have been decimated in large parts of the world due to the expanding needs of humans and the diminishing forest-covers. The fable provides us with an opportunity to talk about this as well.

In the End

Paula asked me if I could bring for her a book on Red Riding Hood in an Indian language and I have promised her that I will look for it during my next visit to India. If any of my readers have a suggestion about this, do let me know.

She also said that her dream is to have a permanent location for setting up a Red Riding Hood museum in Schio, so that people from all over can come and visit it.

After visiting the exhibition I was thinking about how an unusual passion of 2 persons can lead to an important cultural meeting point for so many important issues like children's safety, wildlife and nature and at the same time, bring together the worlds of book writers, illustrators, doll makers, puppet makers, painters and so many other artists and artisans.

***

A Forgotten Palladio Villa

When our Book-Reading group proposed a guided tour of the recently rennovated Villa Forni-Cerato, I was immediately interested because it is one of the Palladio-buildings. Andrea Palladio was one of the best-known medieval Italian architects who had spear-headed the Italian architectural rennaisance in the 16th century. His buildings have inspired architects across the world (for example, the White House in USA was inspired by his Villa Rotonda in Vicenza).

In 1996, UNESCO recognised the Palladio villas as World Heritage sites. There are 24 villas designed by Palladio and the Veneto region in the north-east of Italy, where I live, hosts 16 of them. Villa Forni-Cerati is one of those 16 villas. The city of Vicenza has some of the famous Palladio buildings including the Basilica and the amazing Olympic theatre.

On saturday 6th April 2024, we visited this villa, which is located in Montecchio Precalcino, a 25 minutes drive from Schio (VI) in north-east of Italy. This post is about this beautiful building, its history and architecture.

Why Was Villa Forni Cerato Built?

Villa Forni-Cerato was built in 1565 in Montecchio Precalcino for Girolamo Forni, a timber merchant, originally from Valdastico. It is a mostly rural area, about 20 kms from Vicenza.

Forni was working with Andrea Palladio, supplying the timber for his constructions. Wood-logs from places like Tonezza e Alto Piano of Asiago were used for many of the Palladio buildings including the scaffoldings of the Basilica in Vicenza.

The timber was brought down along the Astico river, which was prone to flooding and thus different dams were built along its course to control the water-flow. Dams became collection-points for the wood-logs brought down by the river. One of the dams was in Montecchio Precalcino where Forni lived and where he had his timber-yard. Thus, from supplying all the timber to Palladio, Girolamo Forni became rich and then he asked Palladio to design a simple villa for him, which was built next to his old house.

Design of Villa Forni-Cerato (VFC)

VFC is a simple villa without flashy adornments and yet, it is like a little jewel for its symmetrical and proportionate design. It was been designed as a cube containing 27 square modules, each side of which is 57.8 cm long, and the whole building can be visualised as a Rubik's cube.

 

The stairs (not the original ones) lead to a loggia on the middle floor of the Villa, with open windows on the two sides, which leads to a central hall with two rooms on the sides and one narrower space between the two, which has the stairs.

Built on three levels, the ground floor had the servants' quarters and the kitchen; the middle floor (the noble floor) was the living areas of the Forni family; and, above, the attic held the granary and stores. The rooms are in 9 modules and each has walls 5.20 metres high, creating huge airy spaces.

Golden Ratio Used in VFC  

When VFC was built, the "Vicentine-foot" measurement (35.7 cm) was used as the measuring tool. Multiplying 35.7 by the Golden-ratio number (1.6180) leads to 57.8 cm, which is the size of cube-sides used for designing and constructing the villa. This might explain why the proportions of this building are so eye-pleasing.

Golden ratio, also known as Divine Proportion (Fibonacci sequence), is very common in nature such as in "human face, flower petals, shells, and the geometrical form of galaxies". It is supposed to produce "a sense of beauty, one of the four human intangibles besides purpose, happiness, and love". (1)

A tile has also been found in the house with an image of "Flower of Life", made from 7 overlapping circles. Both these factors might indicate links of Palladio and/or Forni with groups such as Freemasons or Illuminati during the enlightenment era. (2,3)

Present History

Girolomo Forni didn't have children and after his death, the building went to his sister's Cerato family. Since then the house changed through many owners and was occupied till 1971. The last family living here was Grendene with 10 children. They lived on the ground floor while the middle floor was partially used as a barn to stock hay (the middle floor with high walls and no central heating, would have been too cold for living, especially in winter). Since then the building was abandoned. Finally the building was put up for auction in 2017.

After the first 2 auctions went without a buyer, it was bought by a local entrepreneur from Vicenza, Mr Ivo Boscardin. Ivo explained that he saw an annoucement in the newspaper about the villa-auction and read that no one wanted to buy it, while as a Palladio villa it merited greater recognition. He felt that it represented an important cultural icon for their local history and wanted to safeguard it. Initially, he was hoping to buy it with other partners but in the end, everyone else backed out and so he became its sole owner.

He has created a foundation (Villa Forni-Cerati Foundation) to rennovate and look after this building as he feels that it has an important cultural value for the society and should be properly looked after. 

The Villa Forni-Cerato Foundation needs support and you can make donations for its rennovation by making a bank transfer to the Foundation bank-account (account IBAN code: IT 27D02008 60530 000105470617 - for more details check their website).

Rennovation of Villa Forni-Cerato

During our visit, architect Ms. Francesca Grandi took us around and explained with great passion about the rennovation work and the plans of the building. While the whole building can be visited, so far the upper two floors have been rennovated and the work is on-going. Their aim is to maintain the building as it was, without making any structural changes (such as bringing piped water or electric current or central heating inside the main building).

Another aim is to preserve, as much as possible, the old historical layers, histories, materials and structures of the building. Listening to Francesca talk about conservation of the different layers, highlighted the complex nature of this work and the continuos decisions it requires. For example, if a window in the original Palladio design was subsequently closed with bricks, they need to decide if they should preserve the walled window or restore the original layout?

Over the past few decades, new technologies such as archaeological studies for dating the wood (dendrography) and thermo-luminiscence studies can help in identifying the building materials used for construction in different epochs, including the wood-beams used during Palladio's time. All these technologies are also being used during the rennovation to help understand what changed and when.

Along the centuries and especially during its period of abandonment, some of the old busts and sculptures (for example, the stucco-sculptures and works by Alessandro Vittoria) used in this building were sold or lost. The VFC team has been fortunate to find a bust of Girolamo Forni which had been safe-guarded for 50 years by the neighbours.

Girolamo Forni as an Artist

While Girolamo Forni was a timber merchant, he also loved art and the ideas of humanism. He was also a painter, not for selling his art, but for his passion. Some of his paintings are scattered across the world including in the MET in NY and Palazzo Chiericati in Vicenza. The room, he had used as his studio in VFC, has copies of some of his paintings (in the image below).

One of the sculputures in the Olympic Theatre of Vicenza also carries the name of Girolamo Forni - it shows a bearded man pushing a trunk of wood on the river.

Conclusions

The visit to Villa Forni-Cerati in Montecchio Montalcini was immensely satisfying mainly because of the passionate explainations of our guide, architect Francesca Grandi. The visit was supposed to last one and half hour, it lasted almost 3 hours and still, our group had so many questions to her about the history and rennovation of the building.

I think that Mr Boscardin has been wonderful in investing his money and passion in saving this beautiful building and creating the foundation to ensure its future. I hope that people will contribute to the Villa Forni-Cerato Foundation so that this work can be continued and completed.

References

1. Emund Stefan, Soul and the Golden Proportion, (https://inspirationandenlightenment.com/the-soul-and-the-golden-proportion/ )

2. The Designs of Andrea Palladio for Villa Forni Cerato (https://www.villafornicerato.it/quaderni-di-ricerca/)

3. A study of the harmony of the modules of Villa Forni Cerato (https://www.villafornicerato.it/quaderni-di-ricerca/)

Books I liked in 2023

This post is about some fiction and non-fiction books that I had liked reading in 2023. I want to start with a book which had a strong impact on me.

“How I Rescued My Brain” by David Roland

I loved this book. Often, I had to stop, reflect, go back and re-read. It made me think of long-forgotten episodes from my life and how they had shaped me and my life-choices.

The book was published in 2014 and I had it in my “waiting to read” pile since 2020. It is a memoire of an Australian psychologist about his personal experience of neurological and psychological disturbances, including stress & burnout from listening to stories of extreme violence and suffering, facing financial ruin and finally, a brain stroke, which was not immediately diagnosed.

The second half of the book is about his attempts to regain control over his life, to recover some of his lost neurological and cognitive capabilities and to come to terms with his new body and self, even while he has to negotiate through relationship difficulties with his wife.

This book resonated with me in a personal way. Professionally, as a doctor, I could understand the difficulties of dealing with the pain and suffering of people. I also used to swing between over-empathy and complete detachment in similar situations. David's ideas about compassion made me reflect on those periods and wonder if I could have dealt with them differently.

I have also seen the impact of progressive cognitive decline in persons dear to me, and wondered about its inevitability, as I grow older. Thus, the cognitive challenges faced by David in the book and his attempts to find ways of dealing with it, also resonated with me.

Finally, his ideas about the episodes of deep psychological trauma, which we carry unresolved in our minds, sometimes from childhood, also stimulated me to think of different ways in which we deal with them.

It also has a lot of stuff, especially in the second half, about the potential role of meditation, mindfulness and Buddhism in dealing with psychological & cognitive challenges. I think that it can be a wonderful tool in our paths of self-discovery and development. As I look back on the year gone by, it was the most important book I had read in 2023.

Next part of this post starts with the fiction books and then continues with Non-fiction books that I had liked reading in 2023.

PART 1: FICTION BOOKS

3 Books About Bees and Bee-keepers

It was my year of reading about bees and bee-keepers. I didn't plan it, it just happened. I still have 2 more non-fiction books about bees in my "waiting to read" pile of books.

“The Last Bee-Keeper” by Julie Carrick Dalton is based in a dystopic future-world where all the bees have died and food-grain production can only occur in special green-houses where people work as pollinators.

A young woman called Alexandra is travelling, looking for her home, where she lived with her father Lawrence, who was one of the last bee-keepers in the world. Many years ago, there was a big scandal, when the last remaining bees were lost, Lawrence was sent to prison and Alexandra to foster care. Since then, talking about bees is prohibited.

Alexandra travels under a pseudonym Sasha and does not tell anyone that she is the infamous Lawrence’s daughter. She finds her house is occupied by a group of squatters (young people) and starts living with them. One day she finds out that some wild bees are still alive and they come to meet her in the forest. The bees bring hope to this dystopic world.

There was a time when I used to read a lot of sci-fi and fantasy books. While I like films set in future dystopic worlds, I am not so fond of reading about them. However, this book was an exception, it drew me in and didn't let me go till the end.

“The Murmur of Bees” by Sofia Segovia has been translated from Spanish and is about the Mexico of early 1900s and its war of independence. Written in lyrical prose in the magical-realism style, the book tells the story of Simonopio, a boy born with a cleft lip and palate deformity, who has a special relationship with the bees. The book has a rich cast of characters from his adopted family called Morales, and the people working for them, including some superstitious peasants who think that Simonopio is the incarnation of devil and brings bad luck.

I loved this book's slow pace, and its rich exploration of different characters. From the first chapter, about an old woman who seems to live on a rocking chair, the story grabbed me immediately and did not let me go till the end.

The Morales family persons in the book are too good to be true, always kind and attentive to each other and to their servants, with no trace of prejudice against the deformed child and respectful of his gift of communicating with the bees, while the only evil lies in the heart of illterate peasants. These stark characterisations, gave the book a fairy-tale kind of feeling. 

“The Last Bee-Keeper of Aleppo” by Christy Lefteri - It is a book about being a refugee and the challenges of starting a new life in a far-away land after a huge personal tragedy.

Nuri and his wife Afra live in Aleppo in Syria when the bombings and war arrive in their lives and brings destruction. They start on a difficult journey, passing through the refugee camps in Turkey and Greece. Afra has lost her ability to see and must be helped by her husband. The refugee camp hides other dangers, including persons waiting to pounce and prey on vulnerable people like Nuri.

Finally they reach England, but they still need to find their cousin Mustafa who is also worried and searching for them. Mustafa teaches bee-keeping to the refugees. In the story, bees are the connection between the past and present of Nuri and Afra. It is a book about hope and happiness, even after facing huge tragedies.

“Pavilion in the Clouds” by Alexander McCall-Smith

Some 15-20 years ago, I had read a series of mystery books by the prolific Scottish author Alexander McCall-Smith, known for his detective and crime stories. Isabel Dalhousie was a very unsual detective in that series because she was a middle-aged philosopher-professor in Scotland, who edits a journal on ethics. I had loved reading those books.

Alexander is famous for his series of mystery books based in Botswana (the series of Ladies Detective Agency) - However, I did not enjoy that series. He has also written many other series of detective books including a Scandinvian series, but I have not read them.

This stand-alone book “Pavilion in the Clouds” was an exception and I was happy to finally find one of his books which I liked. It is about a colonial family living in a tea-estate in Ceylon (Sri Lanka) in early 20^th century. Bella, the family's daughter has a English governess Ms White. The wife thinks that her husband is having an affair with the governess. The girl, influenced by her mother, tells a lie and creates the circumstances so that Ms. White can be sent away from their tea-garden. Only, some decades later, a meeting with Ms. White, will make Bella understand what had really happened during that period.

It has a gentle and unhurried kind of story and the surprise revealed near the end was very effective and satisfying.

Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt 

This book is about 3 main characters in a small American town - an octopus called Marcellius living in a marine acquarium, a Swedish immigrant woman called Tuva, who had lost contact with her son some decades ago, and a good-for-nothing young man called Cameron.

Tuva has a special connection with Marcellius and feels that he is very clever - for example, she knows that at night, he can open the lock and go out of his enclosure, then come back and relock the enclosure, just like a crafty teenager.

Cameron, the young man, is going around in his camper looking for his father. He reaches that town and since Tuva has sparined her ankle, finds temprary work in the acquarium.  Marcellius can immediately make-out that Cameron is the son of Tuva's  long-lost son. The book is about the efforts of the octopus to help Tuva to reunite with her grandson.

It is a feel good book, not always very consistent with its characterisations, but I still liked reading it.

Last year I also saw a Netflix documentary about a sea-diver who makes friends with an octopus and discovers that they are intelligent creatures. Because of that documentary and this book, I don't like the idea of killing and eating octopuses.

Beyond that, the Sea by Laura Spence-Ash 

This book tells the story of a young girl called Beatrix, who lives in London, and is sent to live with a American family in Boston (USA) during the second World War. Initially angry and unhappy, slowly Bea becomes a part of her new American family and falls in love with one of the boys. Heart-break comes when the war finishes and she has to come back to London.

It is a family story and a little love story. The book tells about the events from the point of views of different characters and is very well-written.

In an interview, the author had explained about the inspiration for this book, "Over 20 years ago, I read an article in The New York Times about a group of British adults returning to the States to see where they had spent time during World War II when they were young. I was fascinated by this — I was aware that children in London were evacuated to the country, but I hadn’t known that children were sent so far afield and often traveled alone."

One good thing by Alexandra Potter 

My last fiction book from 2023 is about Olive, a divorced, unhappy and depressed woman who decides to shift to a Yorkshire village where she used to go for holidays as a child. On an impulse, she has sold her city house and bought an old cottage in the village, hoping to make a fresh start.

The book is about her life in the village and in a new community, the challenges she faces and her decision to adopt an ill-treated disabled dog called Harry. The dog helps her to find friendships in the village community and leads to her healing.

The last quarter of the book was a little predictable with everything turning out to be perfect, including Olive finding her long-lost sister and the beginning of a new sentimental relationship. However, in spite of this, the book is very enjoiyable.

Reviewing my list of my favourite fiction books from 2023, I can see that it was an year of mostly reading books about family-dramas, relationships and love stories, instead of my usual preference for thrillers and action books. In 2023, I was a bit disappointed by the new books of many of my favourite thriller-and-action-book-writers. Or, perhaps, it means that my reading preferences are changing. 

PART 2: NON-FICTION BOOKS

About non-fiction, I tried reading a lot of those books in 2023, but most of them bored me. Often I read them in bits and pieces and then, left them. Here are a few, which I liked.

The Invention of Yesterday - A 50,000 year History of Human Culture, Conflict and Connections by Tamim Ansary 

This was one of my favourite books this year. It introduced me to the concept of social constellations, which are created by narriatives and meta-netarratives that we use to understand and explain the events and the world around us.

This book takes a wide overview of history, focusing on the inter-connections between events occuring in different places.

For example, the book explains the links between the policies of the Ming emperor in China and the tea-party revolution in Boston, leading ultimately to the independence of USA. America imported tonnes of tea, but the British started charging them big taxes for its sale, because of their trade-imbalances with the Ming regime in China, leading to the tea-party revolution. 

Another interesting part of the book is where the author looks at the reasons for the industrial revolution and the rise of the west. There were three Islamic empires around 1500 CE - the Ottomans in Constantinaples, the Safvids in Persia (Iran) and the Mughals in India. Ansary concludes that all three of them were backwards looking empires which didn't produce any significant innovation and inventions.

On the other hand, the situation was different in China and Europe. China made some interesting inventions like the printing-press and gun powder. In Europe, after the crusades, inquisitions, and the plague epidemics, the social control of the church was lost and thus advances in science could be made. For Europe, learning from the Chinese inventions was the first step, but even more imporant were the incremental innovations, which Europeans added to the Chinese inventions. For example, Europe learned about the gun-powder from the Chinese and added the innovations of guns and bullets to it.

I often wonder about the orthodox-dominence in most Islamic countries. Ansary is from Afghanistan and in his opinion, over the past few centuries, the middle-eastern worlds of Islam, with its subjugation of women, have been moving against scientific progress and innovation. He feels that this situation is bound to be changed by the people over the coming decades, because it excludes them from the benefits of the scientific progress which is helping improve the lives in the rest of the world.

I felt that the last parts of this book dealing with the future - role of machines, biotechnology, climate-change, etc., were a little confused and repeatitive. Still, at almost 500 pages, it was a rare non-fiction book for me, which I didn't skip in parts and read till the very end.

Two Books by Charles Duhigg 

The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do by Charles Duhigg: I liked this book which talks about how our habits are formed, how we can analyse and understand them, so that we can change them.

I especially liked the first part of this book which focuses on the habits of the individuals, such as - how each habit is associated with its cues and triggers, what is the role played by the rituals in habit-forming, and, the idfferent kinds of pleasure/satisfaction that a habit provides. It is imperative to understand all of these before we can try to change our habits.

Smarter, Faster, Better - Being Productive in Life by Charles Duhigg - Duhigg writes in a clear and uncluttered way and brings in psychological insights by giving real-life examples. He does not use the psychology-jargon, which is a big plus. I wish I could write as clearly as he does.

Like the "Power of Habit" above, I liked the first part of this book where he talks about 8 areas which can influence our productivity, such as motivation, working with teams, focus and power of mental models, goal setting, innovation and working with data.

The second part of the book where he has shared his own life experiences and his struggles for improving his research and projects-writing was less interesting for me (in fact, I skipped large parts of it).

Charles Duhigg is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist, involved in writing, doing podcasts and giving talks. I appreciated his books because of his clear way of writing. Most of the time I am bored by the self-improvement and self-learning books because they focus on easy formulas for bringing a change and in my opinion, those easy formulas do not work. However, I enjoyed some parts of these 2 books.

We the Scientists by Amy Dockser Marcus 

Finally, this last book in my list, is about the coming together of doctors, scientists and the parents of children with a rare fatal condition called Neyman Pick's disease. It talks about the impact of the disease and the challenges faced by doctors and scientists to try to find a cure for it.

It tells the stories of children as they try the new and experimental treatments, their hopes and tragedies. It focuses on a new drug called Cyclodextrin, which initially seems to be effective but is difficult to administer (a cathetor must be put in the children's brains, leading to infections and strokes). After all the difficulties, the results so far did not seem to have clear-cut benefits.

A big challenge in finding treatments for rare conditions is that all the data about those conditions and their treatments remains scattered in different places. The book talks about the challenges in sharing that kind of information.

There were positive aspects in these stories, which show that scientists and doctors, with the help of parents, were able to overcome many barriers and start communicating with each other, but the individual stories of the children described in the book still have tragic endings. It was like reading a thriller with a sad ending.

It is a short book (137 pages, plus notes) and I read it in one go. It left me feeling sad and yet hopeful. If we can improve the communication between clinicians and scientists working on identification of drug molecules and sharing of data, perhaps an answer can be found for rare conditions. 

Conclusions

Increasingly I find it difficult to read most books - I start them and leave them after 20-50 pages. This happens to almost 90% of the books I try to read. At the end of the year, to have this list consoles me!

So I am keeping my fingers crossed for my book-reading in 2024. I have just started reading a new biography of Martin Luther King and it looks promising.

Wishing you all a Happy New Year 2024 and happy reading of books that you like!

If you have come so far, please do write a comment with a suggestion about a book that you have read and liked. I like communicating with my readers.

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