Illness as a metaphor. And a “metaphysics of the plague” that accompanies – with its viral and vital stories of contagions and remedies, prevention and cures, births and deaths – a millenary history. Dotted with primates that are often overlooked. It is full of interweaving between science and faith, humanistic culture and scientific research, pauperism and philanthropic solidarity. In these days to walk the Decumano Maggiore of Naples, along that via dei Tribunali which in the ancient heart of the city leads, at number 227, to the imposing sixteenth-century monumental complex of the former Hospital of Peace – a Unesco heritage with the nearby seventeenth-century church dedicated to Santa Maria della Pace, because it was completed in 1659: the year in which the end of the war between Louis XIV of France and Philip IV of Spain was sanctioned – two verses of Friedrich Holderlin: “Where there is danger, that which saves also grows.” Because in the global era of the Covid pandemic, which is now facing a new brutal “war next door”, the excellent testimonies of a past of fighting disease, collected and displayed in a casket of great beauty and dense symbolism – social, artistic , cultural – are flanked by the incessant efforts of humanitarian aid to Ukraine which accumulate, in a silent chain of solidarity, in the nearby church consecrated precisely to Peace. Longed for.
The exhibition is an unmissable, compelling immersive experience “Planet Pandemic, Viral Stories of Infections and Remedies”, recently inaugurated in the Sala del Lazzaretto of the former Peace Hospital, open to the public and schools (9.30-13.30, free admission, reservations required: [email protected], tel. 081/440647; 333/5718341) and from Gennaro Rispoli with Carmen Caccioppoli. Because in the articulated exhibition itinerary, set up with a skilful balance between the more than one hundred accurate didactic panels complete with news and images, the more than 300 rare objects, books and documents of research and medical practice throughout history, and even the reconstructions of vividly realistic environments and characters of hospital care, a useful journey of exploration and knowledge of great emotional impact unfolds: not only through infectious diseases (leprosy, smallpox, plague, syphilis, AIDS, Ebola, Mers, Sars, Covid 19 ) but also within the remedies and scientific research to overcome them, with the discovery of vaccines and antibiotics for the solution. “It is a precious key to interpreting the present through the past», Caccioppoli summarizes it, illustrating the tables dedicated to vaccines in the presentation of the exhibition, yesterday, to three institutional authorities who took part and all intending to involve schools, of all levels, also involved in competitions for ideas on the themes of the exhibition and on the site that currently hosts it, “hopefully permanently, for the memory of the city in a powerful place, returned to the city», dice Maria Filipponedeputy mayor of Naples, in full harmony with her colleagues Lucia Fortini, Armida Filippelli (respectively regional councilors for education and professional training) and with Ettore Acerra, director of the regional school office. “This exhibition on the great medical and health tradition of Naples and Campania – explains Gennaro Rispoli, humanist surgeon, Director of the Museum of Health Arts and the History of Medicine from which the materials on display come from – has a scientific and informative character: for this reason we would like all students to be able to visit it, to acquire information through science, not with the disinformation from fake news, to regain possession of the concept of holistic health by reflecting more consciously on their future starting from wealth of their cultural rootsi».
In this perspective, the in-depth focus on smallpox eradicated by Edward Jennerand the tribute to the contribution given by a young Neapolitan medical student, Vincenzo Tiberio, for the discovery of penicillin (35 years before Alexander Fleming, to whom the credit is attributed), whose antibiotic power revolutionized the drug therapy of infectious diseases: the young man, destined to become an illustrious scientist, had in fact published in the journal “Annals of experimental hygiene” the results of his research on the extracts of some molds, experimented in 1895 in the house of some uncles in Arzano, where the molds present in the well of the house protected family members from gastrointestinal diseases while, when the well was cleared, the same people got sick. The brilliant medical student completed the entire experimental cycle of observation, hypothesis testing and preparation of the antibiotic substance with the synthesis of the drug; but while Fleming was awarded the Nobel Prize for medicine in 1945, of doctor Tiberio, struck down by a heart attack in 1915 at the age of 45, no one has any more memory.
After the stage in Matera, last summer, rewarded by over six thousand visitors, the exhibition “Pianeta Pandemia” thus returns, enriched by new additions, in the city it has generated: “Who – Continue Rispoli – the great medical tradition was born, a synthesis of humanistic and scientific disciplines and mirror of a social history of misery and nobility, diseases and not only therapeutic assistance which will then see in the incurabiline insula the supremacy of Antonio Cardarelli and his pupil Giuseppe Moscatiheirs of the lesson of Domenico Cirillo, Marco Aurelio Severino and many others“. The exhibition is in fact made – in collaboration with the Voluntary military corps of the Italian Red Cross – right from the Museum of Health Arts and History of Medicine (flagship of the recognized museums of the Campania Region), which is located in the Hospital of the Incurables of the Asl Napoli 1 Centro: which today, 23 March 2022, its first 500 years since its foundation, in 1522, the first hospital of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies born from the Christian pietas of Blessed Maria Longo. «A memorable date», Underlines Gennaro Rispoli. Like the far-sighted motto of Maria Longo to protect the health of women and pregnant women: “Any woman rich or poor, patrician or plebeian, indigenous or foreign as long as she knocks pregnant and it will be opened to her». «But the atmosphere that celebrates it, unfortunately, is not that of a party – adds Rispoli -, because war and pandemic have weakened our souls and the ancient walls of the historic hospitals of the city are in conditions of serious decay and abandonment, waiting for a re-functionalization».
Thus, precisely “to spark a reflection on the fate of these places that for centuries have taken care of the health of Neapolitans to their identity”, Rispoli this morning organized a pilgrimage between three old city hospitals that starts from Royal House of the SS. Annunziatawith a visit to the famous Wheel of Exposed, to then take via dei Tribunali, stop at theformer Peace Hospital with a guided tour of the «Pianeta Pandemia» exhibition and finally continue until Monumental complex of the Incurables which in the Museum preserves the historical memories of its activity. The IC Confalonieri schools of Forcella participate in the march, with the head teacher Francesco Fuschillothe Ristori with Stefania Colicellithe art school with Valter Luca De Bartolomeisthe IC Regina Coeli with Gennaro Salzano: a “walk” to symbolize the ancient procession of notables and the sick led, on the day of the foundation of the Ospedale degli Incurabili, by Maria Longo, a woman of Catalan origins with many charisms, interlocutor of bishops, popes and saints (such as Gaetano Thiene, founder of the Order of Clerics Regular Theatines and her spiritual father) and founder in Naples of the order of the Capuchin Poor Clares. And it will be right in the Sala del Cenacolo del Thirty-three Monastery (in via Luciano Armanni 16, from 12 noon), that the event will culminate with a moment of collective reflection on the 500th anniversary of the patronage foundation of a social place to welcome and care for the needy “in the hope that soon the site marked by collapses and the closure of the wards will return to the original vocation of assistance and offer its beauty and the great cultural tradition of the hospital that tells the story of the city», Rispoli concludes.
Not surprisingly, five ancient health facilities in our country have been called to tell their story and rebirth after winning the bet to combine modern wards alongside art places of absolute beauty: the Scuola Grande di San Marco in Venicewith the director of the Museum Mario Po‘; the Ca ‘Grande in Milanwith the cultural manager of the Ircccs Foundation Paolo Galimberti; Santa Maria Nuova of Florencewith the president of the homonymous Foundation Giancarlo Landini; the Santo Spirito in Saxia in Romewith the general manager of ASL Roma 1 Angelo Tanese and the Museum of Sanitary Arts of Naples are the institutions that will tell, through the words of the founding members, the origin and their current state. Foundations, public or private hospital museums connected to ASL, regions and municipalities are, in this scenario, the legal instrument to re-propose art and culture alongside care wards. These are virtuous models, such as that of the Campania Region which wanted to survey and preserve historical-artistic hospital assets next to a Museum of Sanitary Arts that tells the scientific culture born in the ancient hospitals of the city, such as the Museum born with the Academy of History of Sanitary Art in the Holy Spirit of Rome, whose president, Gianni Iacovelli, will bring a greeting.
Introducing and welcoming guests from the various Italian cities invited to tell about the foundation of their hospital and museum institutions, Gennaro Rispoli and the Abbess of the Trentatré Monastery, Rosa Lupoli. Among the authorities present, with the deputy mayor of Naples Maria Filippone, too Gabriele CaponeArchival and Bibliographic Superintendent of Campania; Candida Carrinodirector of the State Archives of Naples; Adolfo RussoEpiscopal Vicar for Culture of the Diocese of Naples and Director of the Diocesan Museum; Nadia BarrellaProfessor of Museology at the Luigi Vanvitelli University and the Regional Councilor for Labor and Productive Activities Antonio Marchiellowhich underlines: «IThe recovery of the Incurables also passes through the redevelopment of the surrounding area: an important tool is offered by the activation of the trade districts which have the dual objective of enhancing the resources of our region and promoting productive and economic development, also shared with Municipalities together with business associations, and aimed at a better production of the territory“. The president of the Acosi cultural association of Italian historic hospitals, Edgardo Contact, will illustrate the initiative and present the founding members Angelo Tanese, Giancarlo Landini, Mario Po ‘, Paolo Galimberti, Rispoli. The conference on 500 years by the Foundation of the Hospital for the Incurable, between science, charity and art will be closed by a report by Carmen Caccioppoli (“Museum of Health Arts: 500 years of care for women”) and Sara Oliviero («Museum of Sanitary Arts: the historical-artistic-health heritage»), while Ciro Verdoliva, general director of the Asl Na 1 Centro who is committed to the project, will talk about the future of the Incurables. Hopefully bright.