The “Cessaniti lights up” conference was held last Saturday in the theater room of the “F. Mazzitelli” by Cessaniti. An event organized by the local association Panta Rei and the regional association Luminarie Calabria, with the patronage of the Municipality and Province of Vibo Valentia. The objective of the event was to present the project of the Museum of Calabrian Illuminations, the first permanent museum dedicated to luminous decorations in Calabria, which will be housed in the Cefalà palace, an Art Nouveau building recently restored and reopened to the public.
Among the speakers are Francesco Pugliese, president of the Luminarie Calabria association, and several experts such as Caterina Pietropaolo, director of the Museum of peasant and rock civilization of Zungri, Vincenzo Calzona, director of the Civic Museum of Ricadi, and Vito Maraschio, president of the Luminaristi association Apulians and promoter of the Scorrano Illuminations Museum. Also present were local administrators, the mayors of Ionadi Fabio Signoretta and of San Gregorio d’Ippona, Pasquale Farfaglia.
The initiative also aims to support the candidacy of southern Italy’s illuminations as a UNESCO heritage site, a craft tradition widespread in Calabria, Puglia, Campania, Basilicata, Sicily and Molise. A long tradition of creating illuminations has been handed down in Cessaniti, with findings such as decorative panels with gas lights from the early 1900s, testimony to the historical and cultural value of this art.
The conference represented an opportunity to promote a cultural circuit capable of attracting visitors to the Vibo hinterland, rich in important paleontological and agricultural sites, and to create a bridge between the history of the illuminations, local culture and the valorisation of the territory .