Il Terrenito 2024

The Third Edition of Il Terrenito cultural program took place in Amantea (CS) from June 29 to July 20, 2024, offering to our community 16 cultural events with free admission in 14 days of activities.

Located at Via Mazzini, 32, in the center of Amantea, Il Terrenito is the center of a cultural project organized by La Guarimba Association, designed to provide gathering spaces and host activities that meet the needs of the area, with the aim of increasing the social capital and quality of life of the inhabitants of Amantea.

The cultural program of 2024 was built in cooperation with local associations, involving all citizenship through participatory processes built over the three years of the project’s life. The idea is that of a private space that functions as a public space, where associative and citizen groups can propose their ideas and organize their events, restoring a necessary place in an area where there is a lack of it.

The main sponsor of the program was, for the third year in a row, Caffè Guglielmo, which believed in the project from the start and supported the idea as an essential tool for increasing the social capital of the territory. The project also received the Patronage of the Fondazione Italia Patria della Bellezza.

THE EVENTS OF JULY 2024

THE PAINTING EXHIBITION AND THE OPENING CONCERT

The program kicked off on Saturday, June 29, with the traditional exhibition of paintings created by Amantean artists. The “Aldo Bruno” Extemporaneous Painting Exhibition involved 12 painters of all ages, who picked up their canvases on the morning of the event, then delivered their work in the afternoon. The paintings were displayed inside the space until the evening, creating a small outdoor exhibition that accompanied the evening concert.

At 8 p.m. the Terrenito stage was opened to the Orchestra Di Fiati Mediterranea Città di Amantea, one of the most important musical entities in our area. During the year, the Orchestra organizes music courses for children and young people, in a very valuable work of music education and training of new talents who have the opportunity to perform live with the Junior Orchestra.

On this occasion, the new young members were introduced to the audience, who performed pieces by John Williams, Ennio Morricone and Justin Hurwitz from the soundtracks of such famous films as Jurassic Park, Once Upon a Time in America, La La Land and Forrest Gump. Afterwards, the full orchestra performed songs from its repertoire, conducted by Maestro Giuseppe Gloria, in front of a sold-out audience.

THE FILM SCREENINGS

Every summer, Il Terrenito commits in film education, offering three programs in a town lacking spaces dedicated to art-house cinema, aimed at different audiences. Curated by the CinemAmbulante Cultural Association with the support of the Calabria Film Commission, this year’s festival was divided into three different programs so as to engage and enthuse people of all ages and interests. For three weeks, Mondays were devoted to the HISTORICAL CINEMA program, dedicated to the Wilder & Lemmon couple; Thursdays to URGENT CINEMA, with three films directed by women about the war in South Sudan, Ukraine, and Palestine; and Saturdays to the CINEMA FOR THE CHILDREN program with screenings of animated films produced by Studio Aardman.

This year’s HISTORIC CINEMA retrospective is dedicated to the artistic partnership of Billy Wilder, a great American director with 25 films directed and 7 Oscars in his career, and Jack Lemmon, one of Hollywood’s most iconic actors. We have chosen three of the seven films they made together: The Apartment, The Front Page, and Some Like It Hot. Three brilliant and profound comedies, to rediscover with our audience a great film couple.

The films were shown for the first time in Amantea in the original language with Italian subtitles, so that our audience could appreciate the great acting skills of Lemmon and all the actors with whom he shared the screen.

The URGENT CINEMA program was titled “Lands of War“, and presented for the first time on the big screen three films directed by three female directors about three countries at war. On July 4, we presented No Simple Way Home, directed by Akuol De Mabior (South Sudan), which tells the story of the filmmaker’s parents, Sudanese revolutionaries and politicians, and the civil war that scarred her family and her people.

A Picture To Remember, a documentary directed by Olga Chernykh (Ukraine), screened on July 11, is a moving reconstruction of the testimonies of three generations of women who lived under the constant threat of Russian invasion.

Finally, on July 18 we screened Farha, directed by Darin Sallam (Jordan/Palestine), an account of the beginning of the Nakba, the forced exodus of Palestinians, through the eyes of a teenage girl.

With this program, we wanted to share with our audience stories of humanity, hope and rebellion, told by those who experienced the horrors of war firsthand.

The CINEMA FOR THE CHILDREN program, on the other hand, was an opportunity to give three evenings of cinema on the big screen to the children of Amantea, who cannot enjoy initiatives related to art and culture dedicated to them in the area. This year we chose films by Bristol-based studio Aardman, pioneers of the “clay-motion” animation technique and creators of entertaining and educational stories, iconic characters and fantastic worlds.

On July 6 we screened the film Wallace & Gromit, directed by Nick Park and Steve Box. On July 13 it was the turn of Shaun The Sheep, directed by Richard Starzak and Mark Burton. On July 20, at the closing of the program, we screened the great classic Chicken Run, directed by Nick Park and Peter Lord.

Audience response was very positive all evenings, and children were able to share the viewing of new films with their families, spending time together and exploring films from the Aardman universe, selected to be able of speaking to all ages, combining fun, educational themes and reflection.

PERFORMING ARTS

In the first of three Fridays dedicated to performing arts, on July 5, we hosted the theatrical performance of the play FILIBERTO, staged by the independent Amantean company La Buffa Agitatori Culturali, directed by Virginio Gallo and performed by Neapolitan and Calabrian actors Maria Elena Aloisio, Anna Maria Liguori, Luigi Malito and Loredana Ponti.

On this occasion, La Buffa has curated a courageous work, recited in the Neapolitan language, which deals with themes related to the transition from the Bourbon Kingdom to the Unification of Italy and the social transformation of the South, setting up with its own forces a visually striking set adapted to the space, in the spirit of Terrenito.

Thus continues the collaboration with a committed reality in our area such as La Buffa, which operates in a space they created in the historic center of Amantea, in the neighborhood of Catocastro, and works to promote independent theater to challenge and move the public.

On July 12 we hosted the Al Mantiah Ballet dance company, which curated a selection of their best performances, performed for the first time with live musical accompaniment. The BEST OF show brought young dancers directed by Elvira Tonnara back to Il Terrenito stage, performing their repertoire influenced by the contamination of Calabrian folk dances and different styles of contemporary dance.

Al Mantiah Ballet, in addition to a company, is also a dance school, training young people from Amantea each year, giving many of them the opportunity to continue cultivating their passion into adulthood. The evening sold out and has, for the past three years, been an important time of gathering for the families and friends of the artists and the entire community.

For the third consecutive year, the Peperoncino Jazz Festival has returned to the Terrenito, bringing to Amantea a great concert by Absolute Three, a lineup composed of internationally renowned musicians Fabrizio La Fauci (drums), Frank Marino (bass) and Salvatore Sangiovanni (piano and keyboards).

The Peperoncino Jazz Festival is one of the most important and recognized events in our region, with which we share the spirit and intention of bringing culture back to the peripheral areas of Calabria. Sergio Gimigliano, artistic director and founder of the festival, spoke on stage before the concert to reiterate the importance of our collaboration and to restore dignity to the Calabrian identity of our cultural programs.

PRESENTATION OF THE BOOK “VIAGGIO DI IDENTITÀ”

An off-schedule event was held on Tuesday, July 16, confirming the project’s intentions to welcome cultural proposals from citizens. Giuliano Guido, a teacher, writer and photographer originally from Amantea, contacted us to organize the presentation of his latest book “Identity Journey – Between Territory and Landscape, an Itinerary in the Land of Calabria,” distributed by Editore Mannarino, a local independent publisher.

It is a photographic journey and travelogue through the land of Calabria, traversing the different identities of the region and the transformations that have characterized its history. Between readings of excerpts from the book, projections of original photographic documents and discussions with the audience, Giuliano Guido recounted his own experience as a traveler and his accounts of our land, offering many insights.

THE VINTAGE PARTY!

On Saturday, July 20, Vintage Market Calabria association set up a vintage market inside Terrenito, creating a space of beauty and encounter. People from different generations came into contact with a sustainable form of commerce, buying handicrafts and products outside of industrial consumer circuits. Exhibitors from all over the region, including farms and small artisans, transformed the space and set up their stalls of accessories, jewelry, natural products, books, comics, clothing and textiles.

Starting in the afternoon, DJ Salvatore Socievole joined the event with his music, helping to create an atmosphere of community and gathering.

THE IMPACT OF THE PROJECT AND THE RESULTS

Il Terrrenito’s program is the result of a participatory process with the community that hosts the space, among associations, artists, cultural workers and all those who contribute by participating in the events.

Our goal is to offer with concrete examples sustainable models of participatory democracy and cultural design, with a bottom-up strategy. All activities were covered by the sponsors and partners, and did not involve economic costs to the public and organizers of individual events. We also gave an economic contribution to the associations that organized their events, always maintaining free admission for the public.

This is a model that has the objective of increasing the social and cultural capital of our area and providing an open and inclusive space for gathering and community, evolving over time according to the needs of those who live it.

This year, the 16 events brought a total of 830 people into the audience, involving six local cultural associations, local company Caffè Guglielmo and the Calabria Film Commission.

A new collaboration was initiated with the Fondazione Italia Patria della Bellezza, which sponsored the initiative and helped promote it through its newsletter and social channels.

We involved participants of all ages, from children for the youngest screenings to teenagers, young adults and the elderly, offering an artistic program in a peripheral area of one of Italy’s poorest regions, far from large centers and their standards of cultural offerings.

For the promotion of the events, we integrated our general communication with the outreach work that was carried out by the individual associations in their target audiences.

We used both traditional promotional tools and our social media channels. We distributed in the town 6,000 flyers depicting the program, divided into days and event category. The press office in charge of event communication carried out a communication strategy focused mainly on the Calabrian territory in the main regional newspapers. The complete Terrenito program was published in the local newspaper Il Quotidiano del Sud, which also dedicated articles to the main events. The project was also presented at the Agora program, which aired on the Italian national channel on July 5th, including an interview to the artistic director Giulio Vita.

All event information was posted on La Guarimba’s website and social channels. On Instagram and Facebook, in particular, we shared daily media contents specially made for the various platforms in vertical and horizontal formats, sharing them in turn with the parties involved in the different projects. By doing so, we were able to reach a wide and heterogeneous audience, providing them with all the necessary information about the events and activities organized. We hired a photographer to follow all events, creating daily photo albums with the most significant moments, which we shared with our audience and associations.

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