The President of the Cariparma Foundation Gino Gandolfi and the Director of the Monumental Complex of the Pilotta Simone Verde inaugurate the exhibition “The Duty of the Festival. Farnese Baroque Ephemera in Parma, Piacenza and Rome (1628-1750)” on Saturday 6 October at 5:30 pm at Palazzo Bossi Bocchi.
Conceived on the occasion of the celebrations for the 400th anniversary of the construction of the Farnese Theatre (1618 ), the exhibition is an itinerary through the spectacular ephemeral architecture created by the Farnese family from 1618 until the extinction of the dynasty: grandiose works, children of that Baroque age from which today’s “civilisation of the image” arose .
Under the ducal aegis, a phenomenon of widespread theatricality, carried out by craftsmen specialized in scenographic installations, can be found in a widespread manner in the two Farnese capitals, Parma and Piacenza, but also in Rome , the center of power to which the dynasty owed everything. What reasons animated the promoters of the sumptuous (and terribly expensive) ephemeral, joyful or lugubrious apparatuses? The aspiration to appear on the world’s stage, the inescapable duty to manifest oneself, under penalty of exclusion from political dynamics and social perception.
The chronological arc of the exhibition, 1628-1750, starts from the celebrations for the entry of Margherita of Tuscany, young wife of Duke Odoardo, and ends with the arrangements for the funeral of Dorothea Sofia of Newburg, when the baton was passed from the last Farnese Duchess to her nephew Philip of Bourbon-Spain. Almost two centuries (1545-1731) of uninterrupted government, during which each duke commissioned ephemeral apparatuses for every memorable occasion, happy or sad, linked to the events of the dynasty. The exhibition will display a rich selection of them, some of which are unpublished or poorly studied, which appear to be real architectural structures – triumphal arches, palaces, theatres and pyrotechnic piers – but are actually built in wood, papier-mâché and stucco: poor and short-lived materials which nevertheless guarantee rapid execution thanks to the tricks of stagecraft , and are often easy to reuse.
Precisely because each of them was erected to consolidate the political and social importance of the promoter, everything was done to avoid the ephemeral nature of these structures, ensuring them a second and much longer life on printed paper : their description, meticulously drawn up by chroniclers, was mostly edited, often provided with engravings of the occasional apparatus or of the long processions of knights and carriages that accompanied the arrival of sovereigns and illustrious figures, as well as the librettos of the theatrical works performed in various theatres of the city, sometimes illustrated with the tables of the scenography specially created.
These testimonies, chronicles and engravings allow us to re-evoke this spectacular phenomenon in the exhibition thanks to the original copies preserved in the Art Collections of the Cariparma Foundation , in the prestigious collections of the Palatina Library of Parma , the Passerini Landi Library of Piacenza , in the State Archives of Parma and Piacenza and in private collections. To these are added the reproductions of documents preserved in more distant archives, which have provided high-quality images: the Bibliothèque Royale Albert I er of Brussels , the Staatlische Graphische Sammlung of Munich , the Museum of Rome and the Zentralbibliotheck of Zurich.
Exhibition itinerary
The exhibition itinerary winds through the main typologies of these apparatuses , with a mostly chronological sequence marked by the succession of the dukes: from a background on Ranuccio I, who wanted to build the Farnese Theatre, to the monumental triumphal arches erected in Rome by the Farnese family, between 1644 and 1730, in the Campo Vaccino esplanade right in front of the entrance to the Farnese Gardens on the Palatine, where by tradition the cavalcades for the “taking of possession” of the new popes passed. Then we arrive at the two Farnese capitals: Parma and Piacenza , where triumphal arches, temporary palaces, sumptuous decorations applied to the facades and astonishing scenography set up inside and outside the theatres, characterised the access routes to the duchy and the streets, churches and palaces of the cities, on the occasion of the entrances of new duchesses ( Margherita de’ Medici in 1628, Dorothea Sofia of New York in 1690, Enrichetta d’Este in 1728) or new sovereigns ( Charles of Bourbon in 1732), or of the weddings contracted by princesses of Parma with European sovereigns (such as Elisabetta Farnese , who in 1714 married the king of Spain Philip V).
Interspersed with the happy events, the ducal mourning also provided spectacular opportunities for the architects, who set up, in a competition of emulation between both the creators and the promoters, imposing apparatuses and catafalques in the main churches, so much so as to change their external appearance and internal space.
Finally, the urban diffusion of theatricality made the squares and suburban open spaces the privileged places of celebration: amazing ephemeral structures dotted with personifications of the Virtues and monsters representing the Vices, communicated moralistic messages, as well as astonishing for their size and pyrotechnic devices .
These events, astonishing for the spectators of the time, are remembered in the exhibition by contemporary printed volumes, paintings and engravings, but also by multimedia tools, videos and holograms, specially created using digital technology : tools capable of informing and “amazing” today’s visitors with the reconstruction of the structures and “special” effects of the Baroque apparatus .
Where
Cariparma Foundation Museum at Palazzo Bossi Bocchi, located in Strada al Ponte Caprazucca, 4 in Parma.