SAN MICHAEL AVENUE
Video installation + performance.
Permanent project by Lenz Foundation of contemporary performance creations, seminars and public reflection days dedicated to the themes of Resistance and European tragedy during the Nazi-Fascist dictatorships.
Viale San Michele. Before the painting of the cellars intends to give shape to the memory of the cellars of Palazzo Rolli in Viale San Michele, home of the prison and place of torture of the Gestapo during the Second World War.
Director’s notes
The video installation will be composed of photographic images taken, in 1990, at Palazzo Rolli in Viale San Michele and the sound off of an interview taken in the same year. On the instructions of the architect Pietro Zanlari and in order to preserve the historical memory, the graffiti of the prisoners locked in the cellars of the palace were all photographed. As the entire building was undergoing renovation, this important find would shortly afterwards be erased during construction work. The images of the graffiti were then used for the staging of Bruno Longhi, a theatrical work of research and historical memory presented in different versions since 1990, dedicated to one of the main leaders of the conspiracy and partisan movement in Parma. In the same year an interview with two of Bruno Longhi’s sisters was also carried out, in which the life of his brother was told and, in particular, the vain search for his body for burial. On January 14, 1945 Bruno Longhi was captured and died under torture a few days later, his body was never found.
This installation is intended to give shape to the memory of the cellars of Palazzo Rolli in Viale San Michele in Parma where, in July 1944, a detached command of the Germanic Security Police (SiPo-SD) was established. On the mezzanine floor were the premises of the guard corps, on the first floor the offices with the rooms for interrogation and torture, in the cellars the cells. The tasks of the SiPo-SD were the hunting and deportation of Jews, the repression of political opponents and common criminality, and intelligence activity. The policemen acted in close collaboration with the Black Brigade, usually dressed in civilian clothes and used unmarked cars. Aided by a thick web of informers, they managed, in a few months, to infiltrate the clandestine network of the Resistance with over eighty arrests. At the beginning of March, the patriots Ines Bedeschi, Alceste Benoldi and Gavino Cherchi, after days of torture, were killed on the banks of the Po and thrown into the river.
SAN MICHAEL AVENUE. BEFORE THE CELLARS ARE PAINTED (BEFORE THE PAINTING OF THE CELLARS)
Video installation + performance
Creation, direction | Francesco Pititto
Performer | Valentina Barbarini, Sandra Soncini
Music | Andrew Azzali
Care | Elena Sorbi
Organization | Loredana Scianna
Administration | Ilaria Stocchi
Press office, communication, promotion | Michele Pascarella
Technical care | Alice Scartapacchio
Video Media | Doruntina Film
Production | Lenz Foundation
Duration | 40 minutes
