On Saturday 22 October, the Castello Volante in Corigliano d’Otranto will host a long evening featuring the international conference “PPP – In the Footsteps of Pier Paolo Pasolini”, the closing event of the ‘Visioni del Sud’ exhibition curated by BigSur, and a musical selection by Carlo Toma on the terrace of ‘Nuvole – Food, Stories, Cultures’, which will be serving its range of high-quality food and wine.
From 4.00 pm to 7.30 pm, the Sala Cavallerizza will host “PPP – In the Footsteps of Pier Paolo Pasolini”, an international academic conference organised by the University of Salento. From Thursday 20 to Sunday 23 October, across Lecce, Andrano, Calimera, Lucugnano and Corigliano d’Otranto, the event will retrace the connection between Pasolini, Salento and the Global South through a literary, linguistic, anthropological and media-focused exploration, celebrating the centenary of the great intellectual’s birth and commemorating his visit to Lecce and Calimera on 21 October 1975, just a few days before his death. In particular, at the Castello Volante, there will be a discussion on ‘P as in landscapes’ with Pierluigi Ortolano, Beatrice Perrone, Marco Gargiulo, Luca Bandirali, Massimiliano Stefàno, Fabio Pollice and Patrizia Miggiano, and on “Pasolini today” with Marcello Aprile, Luca Bandirali, Alberto Carli, Andrea Carlino, Paolo Pisanelli and Carlo Pulsoni.
This will be followed by a guided tour of the exhibition “P.P. Pasolini – Seven Photographs by Cecilia Mangini”, curated by Claudio Domini and Paolo Pisanelli. The exhibition brings together for the first time the photographs taken by Cecilia Mangini of Pasolini in 1958, which are displayed in the Tabaccaia at Castello Volante alongside previously unpublished documents. The photographs tell the story of an encounter between the first woman in Italy who had the courage to sit behind a camera, and a brilliant and generous intellectual, who would shortly afterwards provide the young aspiring documentary-maker with commentary for her first short film and then two more, sealing a cultural and personal partnership that the images of that first encounter had already hinted at.
From 6 pm until midnight (free entry), visitors will have a final chance to immerse themselves in the exhibitions of the ‘Visioni del Sud’ exhibition programme, which opened in July during the Festa di Cinema del Reale and has been a highlight of the long summer at Castello Volante.
For those wishing to learn more about the history of the Castello and the content of the exhibitions, guided tours will also be available from 7 pm to 10 pm (info and bookings: 3519137972).
‘Visioni del Sud’ hosts the project “PPP Pasolini – Sette scatti”, “Approdo” by Adriano Nicoletti; Brunella Tegas’s ‘Quadritos sonori’, created in collaboration with Daniela Diurisi and illuminated by “Pepa Luz”, light installations by Anna Quarta; ‘Moj in tl’ aqua / ‘Nserta dopu nserta’, an installation arising from the final-year dissertation of a group of students from the Urbino Institute of Design, dedicated to women’s labour, which intertwines the songs of tobacco pickers with those of rice harvesters; “Prima di fare fuoco” by Caterina Dufì and “Anemo” by Maria Giovanna Sodero; “Let me in (I hope to enter)” by Federico Rizzo, created as part of the Ucreate artist residency; “Àmati Amàti” by Enrica Ciurli and Leonardo Tondo; “Piccolo uovo” by Francesca Pardi, with illustrations by Altan (in collaboration with InmaLab and Magma aps); “Parallel Eyes”, a photographic installation by visual artist Alessia Rollo, which reworks a still from “Stendalì – suonano ancora”; “Affacci” by sculptor Nicola Genco; “Supernovae” by Valeria Puzzovio, a selection of images rediscovered and recomposed in poetic form. In keeping with the theme of gender identities and freedom of expression, and in collaboration with Persona Festival, the group exhibition “Gender illustration (she / they / he)” and the solo exhibition “This is pink” by Andy Trema have arrived at Castello Volante. Finally, Giuseppe Palumbo’s photographs of 20th-century Salento remain on display; thanks to the collaboration of the Polo Biblio-Museale di Lecce, which houses this valuable archive, Big Sur continues to promote research and public engagement with this body of work.
During the evening, on the terrace of Nuvole, Carlo Toma will present his carefully curated selection on vinyl: Italian music from the last millennium, alongside rhythms and sounds from around the world.