Exhibitions ’06

By focusing on the prestigious mosaic floor of the cathedral of Otranto (1163-65), this exhibition seeks to increase public interest in the culture and wisdom of the Middle Ages. Although ... Read More

The Soviet Union was a country ruled by inflexible laws that were supposed to make man better and society perfect. But in reality these laws were against man. They paralyzed ... Read More

The arch of light which forms the Milky Way, and which stretches across the sky is a spectacle that has filled all generations with wonder, from prehistory to today. Ancient civilizations from all over the world, from the Egyptians to the Chinese, from the Aborigines to the Incas, have built myths and legends around this ineffable heavenly sight. Even throughout the history of Europe many poets and painters have taken inspiration from its hazy and silvery light. Modern science has revealed the physical nature of the Milky Way, by recognizing in it the diffuse glow of the Galaxy in which we are immersed: a spiral structure which contains hundreds of thousands of stars, so vast that a ray of light takes a thousand centuries to cross it. Science has also shown us how the structure of the Milky Way, its evolution, movement, and composition, just like our position in it, all have a decisive motion for the formation and maintenance of our planet and, in the final analysis, for making our existence possible. Even the most turbulent and extraordinary phenomena of the Milky Way, such as the central large black hole, the explosions of supernovae or the halo of dark matter that surrounds it, have somehow contributed to create the favorable environment in which we live. What used to appear as a mysterious luminous trail, today is revealed to be a complex structure, characterized by an order and an evolution that modern science has made comprehensible for us, at least in part. However the purpose of scientific knowledge is certainly not to suffocate the original sense of mystery and wonder which the sensitivity of the ancients felt instinctively, and which the genius of the artist can express in an immediate way. Instead, science has widened out of all proportion our awareness of the vastness and beauty of the Milky Way. Science has also revealed to us that its connection with our existence is much deeper than any far-out pre-scientific vision had dared to imagine. “A che tante facelle?, “...Why so many lights?”: Leopardi’s question, in the light of modern science, becomes ever deeper, more urgent and inevitable. This exhibition helps visitors to view our Galaxy as the “great outskirts” of our earthly environment through high-definition spectacular images of the Milky Way recently obtained from the Hubble Space Telescope and the biggest telescopes on Earth. Films and various multimedia tools may also be used. Items on display will include reproductions of works of art inspired by the Milky Way, as well as historic documents (among them the first few observations of Galileo) and original instruments that have gradually revealed the physical nature of our Galaxy. At the center of the exhibition there will be a planetarium, 6m in diameter, to reproduce a view of the Milky Way and the starry sky. Finally, the Milky Way will be shown to be one of the innumerable galaxies in the universe: even our galaxy, which seems to be so vast, becomes the size of a dot when viewed in cosmic space in its entirety.Edited by Marco Bersanelli, Mario Gargantini, Davide Maino, Nicola Sabatini, Elio Sindoni. With Francesco Bertola and Massimo Robberto as consultants.

What makes a people start rioting in a troubled Europe that has just emerged from a terrible war? The hardships of life; hunger, poverty, unemployment, and the challenge of re-building ... Read More

  A deeper look into the theme of the 2006 Meeting. Not an exhibition, but a journey. Not an exhibit, but an “event” that winds through three episodes, each of ... Read More

  In order to approach the world of Alpine choirs eighty years after the Pedrotti brothers started their first choir, one needs to try to understand what it means to ... Read More

  The return to the classical tradition, which in figurative arts means a return to particular formal principles, is the focal point of a vast phenomenon that began in the ... Read More

  This exhibition uses the charismatic and anti-heroic figure of Igor Stravinskij to explore the musical, artistic, and cultural changes of the 19th century. This great Russian cosmopolitan lived through ... Read More

  The path Dante followed in Paradise, a prelude to his final vision of God, is the proof of an experience possible for all men: it is the experience of ... Read More

  «Jesus came. He didn’t waste the years of his life complaining and always talking about bad times. He cut short. In a very simple way. By starting Christianity. He ... Read More

  “Who will give me wings like those of a dove, to fly and then find rest?” (Ps 54: 7). Can money, health, career, or a life full of comforts ... Read More

  In the years of the Great Depression and the New Deal in America, the master realist painter Edward Hopper (1882 – 1967) looked at everyday life in America with ... Read More