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/)

Art, Books & Friends

 Our reading group in Schio in the north-east of Italy meets once a month to talk about a book. Our "reading season" starts in September and ends in the following June, because in the summer, many group members go away for holidays.

This year, Michela, coordinator of our reading group, proposed a different way to end our reading season - "Let us go out somewhere and do something different." One of our group members, Carla, suggested that we go to the house of her friend Lello, who lives on a hill in Malo, a few kilometres south of Schio.

Lello (Raffaello Rossi) is a retired physical-education school teacher. His house is on Montepiano mountain, at an altitude of about 500 metres. Parts of the road leading to his house are narrow, but it is a motorable road. The house stands at the edge of a precipice looking down at a valley covered with a dense forest.

Life and Works of an Artist: Sem Giovanni Rossi (M. Rinaldi)

Our group meeting started with an introduction by Lello about his father, Sem Giovanni Rossi, who was a painter living in Rome. Seventeen years old Sem had participated in the first world war and risked dying in an Austrian prison. A self-taught painter, Sem worked with oils and tried different painting styles and subjects. He became known for his sea paintings, which he produced in large numbers, and which are today scattered across continents, especially in Italy, Germany and USA, and are signed under a paseudonym, as "M. Rinaldi".

After the introduction, Lello took us around a tour of his home where he has a permanent exhibition of about 40 paintings of his father. I love looking at the art works through the eyes of the artists, as they explain the background stories about their works. In this case, we were looking at artworks through the eyes of a son, who had seen his father make those paintings and it was fascinating.

For example, one of the paintings has a young woman sitting and sewing. Lello explained that the young woman was Alina who worked in a sewing workshop next door to his father's art studio.

For another painting of a house at the Spanish Steps in Rome, he explained that it was the house of Giorgio de Chirico, who was a friend of his father and a well known artist and writer, "de Chirico wanted this painting but my father refused", he said.

As Lello talked about the still-life, the old-walls, the old men sitting and the tiny rays of light illuminating corners of mostly dark and malinconic paintings, it said something about the time gone by, about his relationship with his father and his understanding of his father's art, that was at once very moving, deeply personal and intimate.

Walking and Talking About Books

After the visit to Lello's home and talking about his father's artworks, we decided to go for a walk along a mountain track. For this walk, Michela had prepared sheets of papers for the group members, with brief extracts from the books we had read over the past year.

As we went out, we stopped occasionally for someone to read aloud his/her paper to the others, to try to guess the name of the book and sometimes to talk about the experience of reading that book. The extracts chosen for this exercise were very different, some funny and light-hearted, some emotional and touching.

We started from a tiny church dedicated to San Valentine and then entered a mountain path, initially lined by mulberry trees, loaded with dark and inviting mulberries, full of tasty juices which coloured red our fingers and mouths.

It was not a long walk, perhaps a couple of kilomteres and did not have big altitude differences, so that everyone could do it.

Reaching back at Lello's house after the slow and lingering walk, it was time for drinking and eating. Some of our group members had prepared cakes and snacks, others had brought drinks, so we sat down to eat while Lello shared some other memories about his arrival in Schio, some forty years ago.

Friendships and Connections

As the evening arrived and we prepared to leave, I was thinking about the afternoon spent in so many intense experiences - the beautiful terrace overlooking the green valley, covered with vine trees with budding grapes, Lello's stories about his father's artworks, our walk between the mulberry trees, the taste of fresh mulberries, and the pleasures of listening to the words from the books we had read, evoking memories of their story-worlds.

A key part of the beauty of this experience was made up by the conversations, sometimes long and sometimes brief, we had with friends in the group, as we walked or sat around, sharing about our lives, our plans, our big or small sufferings and challenges. Memories of this afternoon will remain with me for a long time.

***      

Most Beautiful Experiences

What makes some memories so special, that we can't forget them, even after decades? I was thinking about my memories of my most unforgettable evenings and wondering about what had made them so special.

In this post, I want to talk about 5 of my most unforgettable evenings and what made them special.

An Evening at the Taj Mahal, India

Talking about a beautiful evening at the Taj Mahal is a cliché, but since it was one the most incredible evenings that I had ever had, I decided to start with it. I had been to Taj in Agra a few times, the first time in 1967 on a school trip. This particular visit was in 2012, when I was in Agra for a conference. One afternoon, as I came out of a tiring meeting, I decided to walk and ended up at Taj Mahal. When I reached, the sky was already turning pink.

It was still crowded and I decided to sit down on a bench on one side, to wait for the evening. Slowly the crowd thinned and it became quieter. There was an azaan, I think from the mosque on the side of Taj or may be from outside. In that quiet, listening to that azaan and watching the silhouette of the familiar shape of the monument against the darkening sky, it was absolutely divine. It was the combination of beauty, colours and the music/sounds which made this evening so special.

The Uvs lake in Mongolia

I have also been to Mongolia many times. This particular evening was in 2008. We had travelled in a jeep from Bayan Ulgii to Uvs in the extreme west of Mongolia. In Uvs, I had one incredible afternoon in the stadium in Ulaangom where a Buddhist lama had led a special session of prayers.

One afternoon, after we finished our meetings, my friends accompanied me to Uvs lake, about 60 kms away from Ulaangom. The lake forms the border between Russia and Mongolia, which means that the mountains you can see in the image below on the other side of the lake were in Russia.

It was cloudy and windy that day. The contrast between light and dark shades of the dry grass, land, lake water and the snow covered mountains was very striking. A row of white round gers (tents) for the tourists, stood out. There were noisy seagulls and black and white lapwings. There, a few of my Mongolian friends sang polyphonic songs, which is a special Mongolian skill. The singers can simultaneously make multiple sounds, some in a wonderful bass and others, more acute.

The colours of the nature, the wind and clouds, the cries of seagulls and the polyphonic sounds of the Mongolian songs, together created something unique, which made that evening unforgettable for me. Even now, when I listen to polyphonic music from Mongolia, I remember that evening along the lake. If you have never heard a Mongolian polyphonic song, take a few minutes to listen to one on Youtube.

Pasubio Mountain, Veneto, Italy

Pasubio is the dolomite mountain of Schio, the little town in the north-east of Italy where we now live. Its highest peak is at more than 2,200 metres. From our home, a 20-25 minutes drive takes us to the mountain pass known as Pian delle Fugazze, at a little less than 1,200 metres. This was the border between Italy and Austria where the First World War battles had taken place. Hundreds of young men from different parts of Italy, but specially from all the towns of our region, had died here. At this mountain pass, visible from miles all around, is an Ossario, where bodily remains of those young men are kept.

We often go to the Ossario of Pasubio (in the image below). There are may mountain paths marked by the Italian Alpine association, where you can go for trekking. There is a hanging bridge there, about 2 km away, which makes for a nice walk. The evening at Pasubio which I remember is from a visit in 2012 evening. It was December and very cold. There had been different snowfalls, but on that day the sky was clear.

Soon after we arrived, the sky turned pink and orange, lighting up the snow with a strange glow. The moon was already out, not yet a full moon, but still glowing nicely. There was no one else at Ossario, just I and my wife. We stood there admiring the beautiful views till it turned dark. I think that it was special because we were alone and surrounded by incredible beauty.

An Evening in the Petrified Forest, New Mexico, USA

In 2018, I went on a road trip with my sister and one of her friends, in USA. We started from Santa Fe and finished our journey in Phoenix, visiting places like Grand Canyon and Sedona on the way. There is just a 2 years gap between I and my sister and I have a level of comfort with her, which is different from all other relationships. For much of our adult lives, we meet once in a while, usually with our families. Only now, with our children grown up, we can meet without our families and spend our time talking, as we used to do in our childhood.

That road-trip gave some wonderful memories, one of which was an evening spent in the Painted Desert and Petrified Forest. The beautiful shades of the earth, the amazing landscapes and our constant bickering (which sometimes irritated my sister's friend), made it a wonderful evening.

Baja beach on Tapajos river in Amazon region, Brazil

I have also been to Brazil many times, most recently in 2019 when I had a wonderful visit in Rio de Janeiro. However, my special evening memory is once again from 2012. I was with my friend and colleague Deo, and we were visiting a project in Abaetetuba town in Para state in the north-east of Brazil. One evening, we went to a shack on the Baja beach on the Tapejos river, a few kilometres away. We had some beer, and while Deo chatted with some friends, I wandered alone.

Tapejos is a huge river, its other shore was probably a few kilometres away. It changes with the sea tides of Atlantic ocean. The retreating high tide had left its marks on the sand. A group of children was playing football. Strips of land alternating with streams of water, created a wonderful background.

I walked to the edge of the river. A few families with children were there, including a man with a baby boy, who had parked his motorbike and was playing with the child in the water. Slowly the sun went down the sky turned yellow and orange. As I walked back to the beer shack, the man and the baby boy left on their motorbike. The river, the colours, the families chattering, it all created something magical.

Conclusions

I love writing posts like this, which give me an opportunity to revisit forgotten journeys and to remember places and persons, some of whom are no longer alive. I hope that you have also enjoyed this journey, and that it has made you remember some special moments from your own life.

Writing such posts is also about understanding ourselves and our desires. I have hundreds of beautiful pictures of sunsets. Why did I choose these five? Thinking about it, makes me understand myself - what is important for me, and what touches me deeply. I that it is a way of meditating or may be a way of more mindful-living.

Because of smart-phones, most of us have hundreds or even thousands of pictures. Try to make them count - think which pictures matter to you and why? It will help you to learn about yourself.

I think that many factors contribute to making some memories special for us - 

(1) Beauty or aesthetic pleasure is an part of it.

(2) The persons who are with me contribute to making it special.

(3) A dash of music or art can also contribute to it.

(4) Possibility of remembering it through photographs or a diary or talking about it with friends

What makes some moments of your life unforgettable for you?

*****

The Roman Town: Concordia Sagittaria

Concordia-Sagittaria is a tiny town in north-east of Italy, not far from the port-city of Portogruaro. Though it is a tiny place today, it is an important part of the Roman history and it has some good archeological places to visit.

It's history illustrates how the rise and ebbs of time change the fortunes of places and their people. Once an important transit point for the Roman empire, today it is a small but charming agricultural town of about ten thousand persons.

If you are staying in one of the seaside holiday towns along the northern Adriatic coast of Italy like Jesolo, Caorle, Bibione and Lignano, you might like to spend a day visiting Portogruaro and Concordia-Sagittaria.

Roman Town of Julia Concordia

The town existed as a small pre-Roman  area since 9th century BCE, as confirmed by some archeological finds shown in its museum. Romans gave it the name of Julia Concordia.

The Roman empire had started as the Roman Republic in the city-state of Rome around 150 BCE. Julia Concordia was founded in 42 BCE, during the last years of the Roman Republic (Roman empire period started in 31 BCE). By that time, all of northern Italy was part of the  Roman Republic. Foundation of Julia Concordia coincided with the northwards expansion of the Roman empire towards northern and central Europe.

In the second century BCE, the Romans had already built their biggest port in Acquileia, around 300 km north of Julia Concordia. The Annia road connected Acquileia to the town of Padua, south of Venice, while the Postumia road connected Acquileia to the Genova port on the west. Concordia was chosen to be the Roman city because those two key roads crossed here while the Lemene river provided an entrance to the Adriatic coast and to the inland port of Portogruaro. Over the next centuries, Julia Concordia became an important Roman town with the construction of bridges, an amphitheatre and baths.

The local legend says that the Roman legionaire who had shot Jesus Christ while he was on the cross in Jerusalem with his arrow, was from Concordia. Later on St Mark was supposed to have stayed in the house of the same legionaire while he was writing his version of the Gospels. Still later, a chapel was built at that location, which was close to the present location of the St Stephen cathedral.

After the fall of the Roman empire, Concordia was destroyed many times, first by the army of Attila the Hun and then by the Lombards.

During the Roman period, the town of Julia Concordia was known for its arrow-making (Sagitae). Thus, in early 20th century, its name was changed to Concordia-Sagittaria. Probably, it was done during the Mussolini period, when remembering the glorious Roman past was considered as important for the nation-building.  

Archaeological Ruins in Concordia   

Remains of the Roman times dot the landscape in and around Concordia-Sagittaria. There are ruins of mosaic floors, amphitheatre, ancient baths and tombs of the soldiers. Most archeological finds from Concordia-Sagittaria are kept in the national museum in Portogruaro, some kilometres away. Some of the archeological finds are also shown in the local museum of Concordia-Sagittaria.

Underneath the tenth century cathedral dedicated to St. Stephen near the city centre, you can visit the old ruins with a beautiful mosaic floor (the entrance is inside the cathedral).

The nearby Baptistry (in the image below) made in the form of the Greek cross on a square base, is from 11th century while the bell tower is from 12th century.

I was told that some ruins of an old Roman bridge and the amphitheatre were located in the countryside, just outside Concordia town but I was unable to go and look for them.

Walks in the City Centre

The city has a tiny and quaint centre with its historical municipal building, colourful houses and simple trattorias for a relaxed lunch of local cuisine. The Bishop's house from 1450 CE, built in Venetian style and the Town Hall from 1526 CE are two beautiful buildings, to be visited in the tiny city centre. 

Lemene river passes through the city centre of Concordia-Sagittaria. The whole area along the river is wonderful for a leisurely walk or a picnic, while admiring the ducks and geese in the water and the beautiful panoramas.

The city hosts a famous annual local fair dedicated to the city's Patron saint, it is called "la fiera di Santo Stefano" and is held around the end of July each year.

Finally

Italy is full of beautiful historical towns. Most tourists coming to visit Italy hardly ever manage to go beyond Florence, Venice, Pisa and Rome. However, if you are visiting the Adriatic coast in the north-east of Italy for the summer holidays, you can also visit the nearby smaller towns. In that case, it might be worthwhile for you to combine the visits to Portogruaro and Concordia-Sagittaria.

I am not very fond of the seaside holidays, but they are loved by my family. We usally go to Bibione for these holidays. For me the seaside holidays are an opportunity to visit the smaller towns, such as Concordia-Sagittaria and to explore thier histories. 

***

Schio's Cosplay Meet

I had my first encounter with the Cosplay world a few years ago, when I saw some persons dressed like cartoons in our little town Schio in the north-east of Italy. I was fascinated with those costumes and the strange young people wearing them.

I feel a little jealous of the Cosplayers. I think that it would have been great fun when I was young, to have purple and green hair along with an Arabian Nights kind of costume. Unfortunately, it is too late for that and the only costume that can fit me now is a potato-sack! So sour-grapes and all, I try to think of these guys as a new species, Homo comicans, who are a bit of narcissistic nerds, a little clumsy in their social relationships who can only find fulfilment in imaginary worlds. 

Schio had started organising an annual Cosplay meet some years ago. The Covid-19 outbreak had interrupted this tradition in 2020. This year (2022) finally it is back. This post is about ths year's Cosplay. It also talks about a group of graphic and comic book-enthusiasts called Breganze Comics, whom I met in the meet.

If you like costumes, fantasy worlds, comics and graphic novels, then this post is for you. This post has a lot of pictures, which will give you an idea about Cosplay.

A Cosplay Meet

The word Cosplay comes from Costume + Role-Play and is linked with the fantasy games, comics, graphic novels, science-fiction TV serials and films inspired mainly from Japnaese and Korean cultures, especially the Manga comics and Anime. For these meets, Cosplay enthusiasts dress and behave like their favourite characters. They often spend months to design their looks and to make their own costumes.

The Cosplay meets bring together the Cosplayers as well as, the artistic, creative and commercial worlds which support them. These include fantasy board games, miniatures of different fantasy story characters, comics and graphic book creaters and publishers, and cosplay clubs. The commercial entreprises supporting them run shops and clubs where you can 3-D print miniatures, or assemble and colour the miniatures, and print special T-shirts, mugs and other memorabilia. Collecting, exchanging and selling specific materials linked to Cosplay is another area of interest.

Schio's Costumes' Culture

Veneto region where Schio is located, has different cultural-costumes' traditions, such as those associated with Carnival, where people wear medieval costumes and masks. To those old traditions, new traditions of costumes inspired by literary worlds or by other cultures have been added such as Halloween, Steampunk and Cosplay.

Even the Indian Holi festival is also becoming popular and an annual Holi meet is organised in Vicenza.

Schio's Cosplay Meet 2022

This year's Cosplay meet was held on 5th June in the gardens of Fabbrica Alta, which used to be one of the biggest wool mills of Schio and is now used for cultural events. There were all kinds of stalls setup by the Cosplay enthsiasts in the park.

The afternoon saw the competition for the best Cosplay costumes. Though it was a hot day, it had a big audience.

Breganze Comics

During the event, I met some persons who have a passion for writing and illustrating comic books. Their group is called Breganze Comics.

 

Breganze is a small town around 20 kms from Schio. During 1970s, a young writer-artist of comic books called Alberto Simioni started this group. It brought together young persons who were interested in creating comics and graphic novels. Simioni died young, but his legacy lives on with the group. It has had its ups-and-downs but so far, it has managed to be active.

At the Schio Cosplay, I met three artists and members of Breganze Comics - Eleonora Bresolin, Martina Becky Schena and Lorenzo Malandrin, who explained to me about their passion for designing and publishing their comics. Cosplay and comics-related events are opportunities for them to meet other enthusiasts, show their work and sell their comics. Their creative works use some of the original characters developed by Alberto Simioni, and at the same time, they keep on experimenting with new characters. Brainkiller, one of their new Veneto-horror comic about zombies, had come out in 2020.

Franco Carrara, the coordinator of Breganze Comics, was one of the young boys who had joined Alberto Sirmioni in 1977, said: "I had taken over and promoted this group in the memory of its founder Sirmioni, so I am very happy when I see these young persons take over and be active in the activities of our group. They are its future." 

At their stall I also met Michela Mika Fusato, who is part of the Breganze Comics and has an independent contract with EF Edizioni for her romantic comics based on a character called Alicia. Mika also a Facebook page where you can check her illustrations. Seven volumes of her books, all in Italian, are already available on Amazon and book-shops.

In Conclusion

I am happy that finally the Covid-19 restricts have been lifted so that we can have events like this one.

I feel that different factors contribute towards the popularity of Cosplay among the young people. Partly, it is about creative expression in a unique and personal way - individuals can choose a character which appeals to them and with whom they can identify. It is also about the need for magic and fantasy in our lives, which are increasingly dominated by rationality and science. It may also be linked to our feelings of solitude and the need to feel a part of a community.

My knowledge about Cosplay is very superficial - I hardly know about the different Manga, Anime books, shows and games which inspire the Cosplayers. I can't tell you the name of any of the popular characters of Cosplay. Still I like their colours, creativity and vivacity.

I was told that one should never click pictures of cosplayers without first asking them and letting them strike a proper pose according to their character.

Our Cosplay meet in Schio is a small blip among the bigger and better known events like the Comic-con in San Diego and Anime-expo in Los Angels. Italy's biggest Cosplay meet is held in Lucca in Tuscany, while Japan, the original cosplay destination, has a famous event in Nagoya.

Schio’s Old Water Canal

The north Italian town called Schio, where I live, has a one thousand-years' old water-canal. It starts from Leogra river and ends in another river called Timonchio. On its way it passes through different suburbs to the north and south of Schio, going underground for a brief part in the city centre. It is called Roggia Maestra (Master Canal).

Over the centuries, this canal has played a key role in the city’s life and history. Today, it has lost its importance for the city’s industries, however it accompanies some of the most beautiful walking areas around the city and continues to be important for the farmers.

I am always interested in discovering the history of old places. This post is a result of my search for information about this canal. I had found some information on internet, but most of it came from some books in the Schio library. There are some bits of information which are still missing.

The River-Crossing Canal

Schio’s water canal has one peculiarity, which I think is rare among the water-canals – it comes out from one side of the river, after a few kilometres it crosses over the river in a tube-bridge and then continues on the other side of the river. Have anyone heard of any such river-crossing canal in another part of the world? Do share information in the comments below.

Originally there were two water canals on the river Leogra. One was built on its western bank along the little town of Pieve Belvicino, a few kilometres to the north of Schio and it ended in a place called Ponte Canale (canal bridge), which had a wood-bridge for crossing the river. This was the old canal built around 1000 AD. The image below shows this part of the canal.

The second canal one was located along the eastern bank of the river, starting near Poleo area at the northern edge of Schio. It was much longer, it proceeded to the south of Schio towards a suburb called Giavenale where it accompanied the river Timonchio for a distance and then joined it. This canal was probably built later (after 12th century) though I could not find specific details about its construction.

During the second half of the 19th century, when the industrialist Alessandro Rossi was setting up his wool factory in Schio, he decided to combine the two canals by building a tube bridge because there was not enough water in the second canal.

Thus, the western branch of the canal in Pieve was deviated and connected through a tube bridge to the eastern canal. (The image below shows the starting of the tube-bridge where the canal from Pieve crosses over the other side).

On the other side, ruins of an old sawmill covered with vegetation marks hide the exit of the tube-bridge. At this point some water-basins and closes are also located, so that at times of high water levels the excess water can be diverted back to the river. (In the image below, water coming out of the tube-bridge on the eastern side).

Northern Part of the Canal in Pieve Belvicino

“Pieve” was the first important urban settlement of the Schio area. It had come up during the first millennium on the western bank of Leogra. It was connected to the settlements of Magre, San Vito, Malo and Vicenza on the south through a Roman road. It had the mother-church, an old fort and a tower. The people living on the mountains around it, came down here to sell their wool and dairy products. It still has an area called Valle dei Mercanti (Valley of the merchants) from those early days. At that time, Schio was a little settlement, cut off from the Roman road by the Leogra river. (The image below shows the Pieve part of the canal)

The Republic of Venice (Serenissima) and the Holy Roman empires (from Charles the Great to Fredrick Redbeard) competed for power in this area. In the 11th century, it belonged to the Malatraversi family, the Counts of Vicenza. At that time, the old St. Mary church of Pieve was the principal church of this whole area. The first water canal of Pieve probably pre-dates this period. It still passes next to that old church, though it seems that its specific course was changed over the centuries. It provided hydraulic energy through the use of water-wheels for setting up flour mills and wood-sawing mills. It also provided water for agricultural use.

Building the canal must have needed a lot of money – who had paid for it? The church or the Malatraversi family? There are no clear answers to this question, though it seems likely that the costs were covered by the noble family.

Schio's development had suffered as it was located between two rivers, Leogra on the east and Timonchio on the west. It only had small foot-bridges over the two rivers. Probably a carriage-bridge on Timonchio was built in 14t-15th centuries, which allowed it to be connected to Thiene and Vicenza. Thus, In late 15th century, a new cathedral was built in Schio while Pieve lost some of its importance.  The arch-priest also shifted from the old St Mary church of Pieve to the new Duomo church of Schio.

The area had many flour mills and weavers, which used the force of the water-torrents coming down from the mountains. In 18th century, the "Council of 150" approved the production of "Panni Alti" (fine clothes) in the valleys around Schio, so this activity increased. In the 19th century, wool mills arrived in the city.

Among the wool factories set-up in Schio, there was the factory of Francesco Rossi. His son, Alessandro Rossi, took over the factory management in 1849 and slowly became the biggest wool producer. (In the image above the abandoned Rossi wool factory in Pieve, which once had its own rail line). 

Pieve regained some of its importance in 1870s when a Rossi wool factory was opened there along the old canal. Electricity had not yet arrived and thus wool-factories used the water-power to run their machines. However, by the end of the 19th century, gradually steam and hydro-electric powers had replaced the simple hydraulic power of the water-flow and thus the canal slowly lost its importance for the wool factories.

The Canal in Schio’s Centre

The water-canal in Schio was built in the 12th centuy CE. Most of the early churches of Schio including the Duomo came up two centuries later along its western bank. The Schio part of the canal starts in the northern end of the city where the Gogna torrent coming down from San Martino merges with Leogra river.

Soon after it enters the old Cazzola wool mill, which was converted into a war hospital during the First World War, where a young Ernest Hemmingway had worked for a few months as an ambulance driver. (In the image below, the old Cazzola mill, where my mother-in-law also used to work)

The canal then proceeds towards the Rossi and Conte wool mills, which were also built along its western bank, near the city centre. Building of the big wool mills brought immigrants from surrounding countryside to Schio. My wife's grand-father had also arrived in Schio to work in the Rossi wool-mill around the end of 19th century. Thus, in late 19th and early 20th century, new houses were built and the urbanisation of Schio increased. New housing areas for the mill-workers were built on the agricultural lands on the eastern bank of the canal. Thus, new bridges were also built in the city and some parts of the canal in the city centre were covered and it became underground. (The image below shows the canal under the old Conte wool mill).

Some of the old names of city areas are the only memory of those early days of urbanisation along the canal. For example, Via Pasini, the main street in the centre of Schio today, was once called Via Oltreponte (Beyond the Bridge street) as it had a bridge over the canal - this part of the canal was later covered and today many persons passing from there are not aware of the waters passing underneath the street. 

Towards the end of 20th century, with the advent of a new phase of the globalisation, the wool factories of Schio gradually lost their markets and closed one after another. With urbanisation of the past 2 centuries, most of the agricultural use of the canal water had also decreased. Thus, the water-canal has lost some of its importance.

The last part of the canal located in the city centre of Schio still has the old “lavanderia”, the community washing space, where a wooden sculpture of a washer-woman remembers those days when women used to gather here to wash clothes.

Southern Part of the Canal

After passing through the Schio city centre, the canal comes out near Via Paraibo and proceeds to the rural part of the periphery along Via Mollette. The old ruins of the Cavedon sawmill are located here. The last tract of Via Mollette running along the canal has been converted into a beautiful walking/cycling area (in the image below).

From here, the canal comes closer to Timonchio torrent and runs alongside it to the area known as Giavenale-Maglio. Another new cycling and walking path has been created along this part of the canal. (The canal in Giavenale in the image below)

A few kilometres down this walking/cycling path, finally the water-canal ends in Timonchio. The image below shows the last part of the canal along the cycling-walking path).

Conclusions

Today the economic and industrial importance of the old water-canal of Schio has decreased, yet it has become important in other ways. Evolution has taught human beings about the importance of water. Schio and its surroundings are full of beautiful walking and cycling areas that are located next to its two rivers, Leogra and Timonchio, and its water-canal. It also continues to supply water for agricultural use.

Perhaps one day the cycle of the history will turn once again and the water-canal of Schio will restart play an important role in the city’s economic life. Till then, the aesthetic pleasure of its beauty and its importance for the nature are its contribution to the city life.

Researching the history of the canal and exploring its passage through the city was a rewarding exercise. It made me aware of how our landscapes change along the passage of time and events. For thousands of years, this landscape was only changed by the nature, but over the last few centuries, humans have accelerated the pace and scope of this change. Schio and its surroundings are beautiful and I am glad that the city could use some of those changes to improve its beauty through the old canal.

(An older version of the post was first written in June 2021 in my blog)

Meet the Artist - Eva Trentin

Eva Trentin is an artist from Marano Vicentino, a tiny commune a few kilometres away from Schio (Veneto, Italy), where I live. Her art is closely linked to the nature and the natural world, such as flowers, leaves, plants and trees. Her works combine the organic world with UV photography and some special techniques of imprinting on paper and clothes, creating designs which look like rain-washed shadows of fossils.

I am always very keen to meet artists and to understand the ideas underlying their artistic evolution. Recently, I had an opportunity to talk to Eva and to visit her art-studio. This article is an introduction to her and her art-world. Let me start it by showing you an artwork called "289" which had a profound impact on me when I had seen it at the Mutazioni exhibition in Schio in 2021.

Meeting Eva

This work "289" was my first real encounter with her at the Mutazioni art exhibition held in Palazzo Fogazzaro, our local venue in Schio for important art events. I was captured by it and in an article about that art event, had described its impact on me with the following words: "I want to close this article with the work I liked most in this exhibition - I absolutely loved the mosaic like works of Eva Trentin from Marano Vicentino, with each piece of the mosaic expressing nature, places and moments of life. I felt that I could look at them for hours, find new points of reflection and at the same time, feel an emotional connection with them."

The image below of her another artwork titled Mare (Sea) is also from the same exhibition.

My second encounter with Eva came during a visit to the fifth Schio Biennale on Paper-art, when I was invited by Valeria Bertesina, the curator of the Biennale, for a special guided tour of the exhibition. Eva was also invited to it. We were together in a small group for a few hours. We spoke briefly but at that time, I didn’t realise that she was the same artist whose work I had liked so much.

Fortunately, some weeks later Eva saw my article on this blog and contacted me. So, recently I went to visit her home and her art studio in Marano Vicentino, where she lives with her husband and twin daughters. It was an opportunity to talk to her about her artistic journey and the ideas underlying her art.

Eva’s Artistic Journey

Her artistic journey started in an art institute when she attended the G. de Fabris artistic school in Nove (VI), which was followed by a degree in interior design at ISAI Academy in Vicenza. For many years Eva worked in a studio of interior designers and architecture, till about 6 years ago when she started a new phase of her life as an artist, after her husband gifted her some plastic art materials, which led her to taking up art more seriously. Soon, she gravitated towards the use of flowers in her art.

During the last couple of years, she has started experimenting with botanical printing inspired by the works of Australian artist India Flint, who uses leaf printing, eucalyptus dyes and botanical alchemy, garment cutting and stitching, paper-folding, bookbinding and a little poetry; and by the Israeli artist Irit Dulman, who makes monochromatic and colour botanical prints on silk and cellulose fabrics.

Thus, Eva started experimenting and combining different techniques which use organic materials such as tree-barks, leaves, flowers and resins for paper-printing and then combined them with photography, cyanotype and fabric-printing.

Art Techniques of Eva Trentin

Eva has developed her own art techniques which I call “delicate imprinting” - it involves organic matter such as leaves and flowers which leave their imprints on paper and tissues such as silk, and which look like fossils drawn in gentle lines and soft colours. These imprinted papers and tissues can then be combined with resins or cut into different shapes, can be placed on different surfaces covered with gold-leaf or cyanotype, sometimes combined in mosaics of hundreds of small pieces, which look like scrolls telling stories like the two works presented above.

I am not sure if these techniques of imprinting organic matter (Botanical Prints on Paper or fabrics) to create art have a specific name.

She explained to me about the Cyanotype technique, as I was not aware of it. Later, I searched for it online to understand it better. Wikipaedia defines it as “is a slow-reacting, economical photographic printing formulation sensitive to a limited near ultraviolet and blue light spectrum, the range 300nm to 400nm known as UVA radiation. It produces a cyan-blue print used for art as monochrome imagery applicable on a range of supports, and for reprography in the form of blueprints. For any purpose, the process usually uses two chemicals: ferric ammonium citrate or ferric ammonium oxalate, and potassium ferricyanide, and only water to develop and fix. Announced in 1842, it is still in use.”

Over the years, Eva has made a conscious choice of moving away from chemical products and using only natural materials in her art. For example, she experiments with the extraction of natural colours from the flowers, barks and leaves for her art. She defines these natural colours as being “multi-vibrational with specific mutating tones, because every colour is composed of different shades whose vibrations combine together, and which transmit a sense of equilibrium and aesthetic pleasure”.

Eva’s Studio

Her studio is a workshop where she keeps her collections of leaves, flowers, tree-barks and their extracts. “I am not very orderly, sometimes, I forget to label the things and then I have to throw them away”, she confesses candidly, while showing off a box full of barks of different trees which her father had collected for her.

Actually, her studio, located in the attic of her home, seemed to be in perfect order, everything was labelled and placed in boxes, though the fridge was kind of overflowing with them. A microwave oven and a couple of steam baths are part of her art equipment as she needs to keep her leaves and flowers wrapped in the paper for many hours at a time, while they leave their imprints.

Eva is also experimenting with other ways to use her art for making daily use objects. She is collaborating with a jeweller for making ear-rings while her imprints on silk are being used for making unique kimono-like jackets (image above).

For learning more about Eva’s art and for buying her art works, ear-rings, textiles and kimonos, you can check her Facebook page, Instagram Page and her website.

Conclusions

Meeting Eva and learning more about her artistic process was like opening a door and discovering a new world of conceptualising and experimenting with art. It was a world where nature and natural processes, some what similar to the those which lead to the making of fossils, are used to create art. It also made me think of the prehistoric artists who had left their hand-prints and drawings in the caverns and rocks in different parts of the world.

Every encounter with a new artist is a journey for discovering new ways of expressing artistic impulses, sometimes through new materials and/or techniques. That artistic expression can be seen as a continuum on a spectrum, which goes from sparse lines drawn on sand or rock, to paintings using different materials, to sculptures of stones and metals, to new ways of combining emerging technologies. Eva's work are located on that spectrum close to nature where dream like delicate figures in soft colours become manifest through her imagination.

I love meeting artists and trying to understand their specific gaze and thinking which underlies their creative expressions. Meeting Eva was a wonderful part of that journey.