Last weekend, on 18-19 November, Italy’s first ever “festival of meme culture” took place in Turin with the noble aim of bringing together some of the country’s most celebrated and prolific digital content creators IRL to talk about mass communications, comedy and politics. Memissma, which was set up by the Hipster Democratici podcast team, is a genuine novelty in the Italian media landscape; a young, fun, ironic, cheeky, creative, playful gathering that could hardly be further removed from the usual geriatric conferences of the Ordine. So much for the better if you ask me. Now, I admit, I follow a fair few novelty accounts on various social media so I recognized plenty of familiar names in the line-up: Andrea Masino and Alessandro Ruggiero (of course) Eman Russ, the masked Florentine maverick, Grande Flagello, the media-hacker, and Milano Nobile 2.0 to name just a few. I also discovered a bunch of new, tiny, content-producers including Lievito Consulting, Social Slam and Inchiestagram all of which were top-drawer finds. I should add here that the festival had a serious side too. Journalists from Wired Italia and Il Fatto Quotidiano took part in panels about pubic art and mass communication, and the team behind the cinema festival, which I’ll be attending next week, also gave a talk on the links between film culture and digital images. I’ve heard through the grapevine, with good authority, that the organizers are planning a second edition in 2023. So if you’re into this kind of stuff, keep the project on your radar and in the meantime head to the festival’s Instagram page for an easy, and sometimes not so easy, chuckle.
In Italy, as elsewhere, climate activists with XR, Fridays for Future, Just Stop Oil, and Last Generation have been escalating actions over the past two weeks to draw attention to the woefully inadequate environmental provisions being taken by our representatives at COP27. Before getting to the nitty gritty I first want to draw attention to three protests that have gone almost entirely unacknowledged in the public sphere. In Naples earlier this month over ten thousand citizens took to the streets to march against fossil fuel use, calling on leaders to develop a just transition plan for working people. In Rome, a tiny group of militant demonstrators occupied the private jet runway at Ciampino airport, blocking air traffic to draw attention to the fact that 50% of Europe’s Co2 emissions by plane are caused by the richest 1% of the population. In Milan, high-school students threw flour at an Andy Warhol sculpture of a car to problematize the work’s superficial fetishising of a polluting vehicle [see video below]. Now, I'm sure everyone has different views on what makes a protest effective. But I hope most of us can agree that the active criminalizing of journalists who report on these issues, and ongoing media hostility, is unacceptable. Rather than polemics, why not focus on the real, challenging, important questions here: what does it mean for a protest to succeed or fail? What does social science tell us about the efficacy, or otherwise, of these kind of performative actions? And perhaps most important of all: what is the real meaning of these fragmented gestures in a climate where sustained social movements are almost entirely absent? Answers on a postcard please…
The historian Carlo Ginzburg has a new book out in English this month called The Soul of Brutes. According the jacket blurb, this collection of “diverse yet interconnected essays” brings together several of his recent essays and lectures on topics such as Herodotus, animal consciousness, Italo Calvino’s aesthetic project, native American epistemologies, Alessandro Manzoni’s novels and the ethics of historiography. I’ll be honest, having only read The Cheese and the Worms - Ginzburg’s 1974 treatise on micro-history seen through the intimate experience of a 16th Century miller - I have no basis from which to vouch for the author’s capacity to speak to such diverse themes (though that book is certainly is a masterpiece, and I’m told by many others that his oeuvre is filled with similar gems). So check this out if you are a fan of Ginzburg’s, or if, like me, you’re simply on the lookout for an unusual, probably-pretty-erudite read.
Arts and culture: opening night
OK, so when I saw this story yesterday morning I genuinely almost choked on my cornflakes. Francesca Moody, a theatre producer who was also one of the minds behind the hit TV show FleaBag, has just announced her involvement in a new musical about Silvio Berlusconi which will hit London’s Southwark Playhouse Elephant early next year. Yes, that’s right. You read correctly. A musical. About Berlusconi. A musical. About Silvio Fucking Berlusconi. Excuse my French, but I don’t even know where to begin with this one. First there’s the fact that the show, apparently, describes itself as “Evita on acid” and is said to feature a song about Putin called “My Weekend With Vladimir” alongside other Eurotrash beats. Then there’s the plot, which “depicts the three-time former Italian PM on the eve of the verdict in his trial for tax fraud as he looks back on his rise and fall” and which, frankly, sounds as dull as ditchwater. Just no. No, no, no, no, no. I mean obviously I’ll be reviewing this one. In fact, my flight to London is already booked. But there’s just no need for this whatsoever. We’ve already had Sorrentino’s Loro — a masterclass in exactly why Il Cavaliere is best left ignored altogether. Instead, thanks to rubbish like this, the circus will go on. Because however slanderous this performance is, however ‘good’ or ‘bad’ the production itself, you just know the man, and his fans, are going to love it - while the rest of us go home feeling smugly self-righteous. Yuck!
Finally, a bit of local news for all you Tuscan readers out there. Last weekend the New Teatro of Fiesole opened its doors down in Piazza del Mercato, just next to the library, and about 200 metres from my house. I’m not going to lie, this is massive for the community. Fiesole, if you’ve never been, is about a 15-minute drive up the hill from Florence. It’s a nice area, and well-worth checking out if you’re here; particularly in the summer, in June-July when the festa dell’unita folk and food festival runs and the open air cinema and concerts are on. The rest of the time it’s just pleasant. Tranquillo. We have our trattorias, we have the casa del popolo, we have the music school and that’s about it. Well, the new building, which has been 20 years in the works, is set to be a game-changer. The goal, according to the local comune, is to maintain Fiesole’s summer energies throughout the year, which sounds good to me. Things kicked off on Monday with the pianist Alexander Lonquich and the Orchestra V. Galilei playing Mozart. Next-up we’ve got a few Shakespeare shows and a film series run by the Stensen Cinema. Click here for the full programme.
Recipe: Bonèt/Bunet
A few of you have been complaining that I don’t share enough sweet dishes here so I thought it was about time to rectify that. Bonèt, if you’ve never heard of it, is a dish from Piemonte’s Langhe area which, according to some sources, dates all the way back to the 13th Century. The name, as in English, refers to a ‘hat.’ Just as the hat is the last thing you put on before going out the door, so the bonèt is the last thing you eat before a meal ends. Apparently. So I’m told. Or something like that. Who really knows? The main thing is: this is delicious. Essentially, we’re talking here about a chocolate-infused creme caramel, flavoured with crushed up amaretti biscuits. It’s not the easiest or quickest dish to make but it’s well worth the effort for a special occasion. Emiko Davies has a good recipe in her book Torellini at Midnight which works well, and which, conveniently, is also available online here in case you’re interested. I recommend bringing this out at the end of a dinner party, with coffee and perhaps a dash of nocino for a truly decadent fine pasto.
About Me
My name is Jamie Mackay (@JacMackay) and I’m an author, editor and translator based in Florence. I’ve been writing about Italy for a decade for international media including The Guardian, The Economist, Frieze, and Art Review. I launched ‘The Week in Italy’ to share a more direct and regular overview of the debates and dilemmas, innovations and crises that sometimes pass under the radar of our overcrowded news feeds.
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