Once a year, on 7th December the city of Milan is proud to celebrate the day dedicated to its patron saint who is Saint Ambrose, called by Milan’s citizens “Sant’Ambrös”!
Saint Ambrose Day has really ancient origins and through the years it has been keeping the affection and the participation of all Milan’s inhabitants, who between the ritual mass of 7th December in the beautiful Basilica of Sant’Ambrogio and the stalls of “Oh bej oh bej” fair, cram the streets of the city to celebrate this great event.
The fair, which dates back to 1288, takes its name from the exclamation of Milan’s children who, between the stalls full of toys and sweets, couldn’t help marveling and shouted “Oh bej oh bej” (that it means “Oh, how nice! How nice!”).
Usually this event, which is a real festival of colours, lights and (more…)
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After Neoimpressionism, Milan goes on with its great artistic season and dedicates an extraordinary exhibition to René Magritte, entitled “Magritte e la Natura” (“Magritte and the Nature”).
The exhibition, which will start next 21st November in Milan, shows as protagonist one of the most eclectic personages in the panorama of last century’s art. One hundred artworks on view, among collages and paintings, which retrace the artistic itinerary of Magritte from the first futurist paintings to 50s’ advertising campaigns.
The whole exposition revolves just around one theme: the nature. The continuous presence of nature in the painter’s artworks, its importance, and the peculiar way to develop this theme. Magritte shows his surrealist fingerprint by using nature as a fragment of reality to reach a surreal world.
Managed by Michel Draguet, the exhibition underlines (more…)
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Technologies and the ICT world don’t stop their growth and Smau comes back once again in Milan, this year on its 45th edition.
SMAU 2008 (“Salone Macchine Automazione Ufficio”, “Office Automation Trade Fair”) is the most important trade fair in Italy, entirely dedicated to the technological growth and development. SMAU is a unique event which every year suggests to all its visitors (enterprises and ICT operators) the most innovative technologies created by Italian research.
Smau especially focuses on continuous development and progress which every year the Italian research makes more and more, and the exhibition’s aim is most of all to increase the value of this growth, emphasizing the concrete results which technology brought on companies, mentioning (more…)
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From 10th October at Palazzo Reale of Milan people will be able to admire the great exhibition dedicated to the founding fathers of the Neoimpressionist movement entitled “Seurat, Signac e il Neoimpressionismo” (“Seurat, Signac and the Neoimpressionism”).
Seurat and Signac used to paint their precious canvass at the island of la Grande Jatte, where they portraited scenes of daily life in which nature is the real mistress; simple sceneries made unique by the incredible ability to capture every fragment of light and color on the canvas.
The exhibition is divided into seven great sections which follow a chronological order, and which retrace the artistic itinerary of these great artists, offering (more…)
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The next Italian week-end will be entirely dedicated to art and culture. Yes, because on 29th and 30th September Italy will take part to the European Heritage Days, this year with the name “Le grandi strade della cultura: un valore per l’Europa” (“The wide roads of culture: a treasure for all Europe”).
Therefore, to make Italians and tourists happy, during this week-end all the art places, as museums, archaeological sites, and art galleries will open their doors to the public, with free entrance. People will also have the chance to enjoy the organization of many exhibitions, concerts, conferences and guided artistic itineraries.
European Heritage Days are a perfect and unique opportunity to know and explore with no limits all the treasures of our country, discovering historical and artistic details, which make the Italian artistic heritage one of the richest in the world. For two special days, Italians and tourists from every corner of the world will have the opportunity to visit thousands of art places and to see artworks which for the first time will be admired by the public.
In this edition of European heritage Days, special attention will be given to ancient churches and buildings of our country, which are the most important proof of 20th century’s Italian art history, and which have been remained in the shadow for too much time.
In fact, (more…)
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The autumn in Milan is divided into two parts, between a ‘goodbye’ and a ‘welcome’ to two of the most important events in our country: the ‘Milano Film Festival’ and ‘Comiconvention’.
Yes, because on the 21st September the ‘Milano Film Festival’ will come to end, one of the most important cinematic events in Italy. The Festival, which every year gathers together hundreds of cinematography fans and experts in the wonderful Milan, is famous most of all for the great involvement of many movie directors, authors and works from numerous countries in the world.
The manifestation is made up of several sections, each one dedicated to an important piece of the cinema world. There’s the ‘Concorso Lungometraggi’ (‘Full-lenght Movies Competition’), which presents 10 movies from 9 different countries, all works of young authors; the ‘Concorso Cortometraggi’ (‘Short-Movies Competition’) with 48 short movies from 23 countries; and in addition, there’s “Retrospettiva” (“Retrospective”), which is certainly one of the most charming appointments of Milano Film Festival. This year it’s entitled “The Imaginarium of Dr. Gilliam”, and shows an unmissable retrospective on Terry Gilliam’s visions. But the “Milano Film Festival” is not only cinema… the cinematic event infact will be flanked by Musica’ (‘Music’), a series of concerts of every kind of music which are oriented towards most of all the youngest ones, making in this way the Festival a place to meet and know new friends.
So, we are talking about meetings, youth and parties… and these are just the same keywords of the other great event which will take place in Milan and will open the next Autumn season: Comiconvention! (more…)
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As well as last year the legendary Novegro summer festival – Beer Festival, will take place starting from Friday 27 June to Sunday 13 July with a wonderful program: It will be possible to taste every kind of beer, to take part in beer tasting courses, concerts, cabaret shows, the awesome disco night and the entertainment for the children will be organized. Everything is happening in the new green area of the Novegro Exposition Park (Milan – Italy).
The protagonist of the festival will be the “beer”, principally the hand crafted one from a lot of European countries, with the opportunity to take part in free tasting courses organized by the Beer Tasting Association (every night ‘til 9.30 pm) and the chance of tasting beers with palatable food of any sort dedicated area, opened since 6.30 pm to 2 am.
The entertainment program is set up with the following concerts (more…)
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Once again high fashion is shown in Italy, once again the destination chosen to this purpose is the city of Milan.
Well, the Italian capital has been turned again into the meeting point of famous high fashion stylists who are there to show their 2009 spring-summer collections.
Starting from Saturday the 21st, the best prêt- -porter clothing for men and the most famous accessories brands for spring-summer 2009, will be shown on Italian fashion runways until June 24th. According to the final program, published by Camera Nazionale della Moda Italiana - the body dealing with organization and management of this event - fashion shows started on Saturday 21st of June with Gaetano Navarra, during the same day followed by Missoni, Jil Santander and Versace. Sunday 22nd was the time of famous stylists such as Salvatore Ferragamo, Gianfranco Ferrè, Prada, Roberto Cavalli. Again, today Coveri, Biagiotti, Gucci, Moschino and Krizia, arriving to Tuesday the 24th, when you will find among the others, Armani, Fendi and Marni. Byblos will close the fair.
As every year happens
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Extended until 28th of August the exhibition that Palazzo Reale in Milan, in cooperation with Skira and Arthemisia organizes about Francis Bacon. He is considered the last of the great 20th century masters and the one who could transmit the uneasiness of the modern man in painting.
With this great event, the city of Milan wants to celebrate the centenary of Bacon’s birth that will occurr next year.
The exposition, handled by Professor Rudy Chiappini, shows in an exhaustive way the artistic career of the irish artist through its works coming from the most important museums and collections worldwide.
The core of the artistic display provides for the exposition of over one hundred works, almost all as yet unknown here in Italy, including eighty-two paintings and about fifteen drawings, plus as many objects that are part of the archive material carrying the artist’s mark. More than fifty years of career described by a large number of works which range from paintings to sketches and pictures.
A room of Palazzo Reale presents, for the first time in Italy, the photographic reproduction of Bacon’s studio of London, which was the little microcosm where he lived between 1961 and 1992, the chaotic studio where he kept all his books, papers, sketches, colours, canvases, photographs and notes, and everything else that could be a source of inspiration for him. The show opens with a set of important works on paper, which were only found after the artist’s death and have never been displayed in Italy before. Then it continues with the paintings dating back to the years after the Second World War, when Bacon made himself known at an international level thanks to the “Studies for Figures” and to his “Heads”.
Special attention is given to document Bacon’s activity in the ’50s, which was devoted to portraits made just for his friends or made to order. These paintings are dwelled by blurred and ghastly figures, desfigured and deformed faces and bodies disappearing into the darkness of the background. During the following decade, his characters started appearing in a more definite and lit space and they gain volume and expressiveness. In the great triptychs of the ’70s, his care for individual subjects had become slightly exasperating.
Among the works exposed, we mention in particular “Three Studies of the Male Back” and “Triptych”. Only during the later years of his life, Bacon stopped “fighting” with the characters of his paintings, showing their inner essence and transforming them into a few spots of colour clotted on neutral backgrounds.
A voyage (more…)
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Until 2nd June 2008 Palazzo Reale in Milan will host an exceptional exhibition dedicated to one of the greatest representatives of Italian Futurism: Giacomo Balla.
At the exhibition called “Giacomo Balla - La Modernità Futurista” (”Giacomo Balla - The Futurist Modernity“) it will be possible admire the whole Balla’s futuristic production, movement to which the artist conformed later than his contemporaries. The exhibition is founded on the study and the analysis of his futuristic artworks, true fount of energy.
Virtuosities of shapes and colours, broken shapes which give movement to the pictures. Artworks which still talk about sensations and shivers, maybe because of Balla’s previous artworks.
Spectators can admire about 200 artworks on exhibition, and for this occasion they will have the chance to retrace the whole artistic itinerary of the painter, highlighting the crucial moments of change.
The exhibition’s journey (more…)
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