Ivrea, three days of celebration with the Cosmo parade, reading and fun

IVREA. Friday 17, Saturday 18 and Sunday 19 June: the dates are circled in red on the calendar. No weekend by the sea or in the mountains, in the city there is a program so rich in books, culture, exhibitions, music, dinners and aperitifs, that it cannot be missed. These are the three special days that mark the start of the great party for Ivrea, the Italian capital of the book 2022. On where to go and what to see, you are spoiled for choice.

Let’s start from the end, with the appointment on Sunday 19 with the Magical Book Parade: a traveling party in the streets of the city in which music and words will mix, under the guidance of Cosmo, a well-known songwriter, DJ and record producer from Ivory Coast, and of the Ivreatronic group, a research collective in the field of electronic music. The event, which is causing so much discussion in the city and which has caused some right-thinking people to turn up their noses even within the Municipality, was designed to bring the under 30 bracket closer to the Book Capital. The question that everyone is asking is: will be the drag queens (because it seems that this was the problem for some). Yes, there will be a drag queen, a trapeze artist and a juggler. But above all there will be many young people. The wagon of the book parade (appointment at 2 pm in Piazza Lamarmora) will cross the streets of the city followed by the public: it will be a real explosion of colors, a secular procession of sounds, dances and words to mark the start of a long party. year. The music of Cosmo and Ivreatronic will alternate with the readings of the great classics selected by Davide Gamba.

The opening of the three days of celebrations is dedicated to the final of Incipit Offeresi, the national tournament for aspiring writers who will compete with unprecedented incipits (6 pm, in Santa Marta).

Olivetti historical archive

Saturday 18 will open with a guided tour of the library of the Olivetti Historical Archive Association, which collects the great book production that has characterized the history of Olivetti, including collections relating to its founders and those who collaborated with the company (4 pm, via Miniere 31; reservation required by 12 noon on Friday 17 at [email protected]). The collection includes, for the most part, monographs, gray literature and periodicals from the Olivetti factory libraries, conferred to the library thanks to the deposit agreement stipulated in 1998 between the Olivetti company and the Olivetti Historical Archive Association. The visit will be repeated on Sunday 19 at 10.30.

Twelve books for twelve months

The next appointment at 6 pm at the Garda museum, with the inauguration of the exhibition Twelve books for twelve months. Universo Olivetti, a kaleidoscope between a printed page and a work of art, dedicated to the Strenna books of the Olivetti collection, 50 years after their first publication. The Strenna books were born from a vision of Giorgio Soavi (writer, poet and journalist, then art director at Olivetti) who conceived the series in 1972 with an edition of Collodi’s The Adventures of Pinocchio illustrated by Roland Topor. The book, like almost all those that will follow, is in a large format to enhance the drawings; the plates are reproduced with great care, the cover is cloth, of various colors. A book that is also a “beautiful” object to keep at home and collect. This will be followed by many others, of which it is possible to admire the over 150 original plates created by Roland Topor, Kaneko, Kuniyoshi, Giovanni Grasso Fravega, Flavio Costantini, Tullio Pericoli, Emanuele Luzzati, Paul Davis, Bruno Caruso, Ludmill Siskov, Milton Glaser , Davide Pizzigoni, Hans Hillmann and Agostino Arrivabene. Twelve books for twelve months is the third exhibition of the project to enhance the Olivetti collection of works of art, now owned by Tim, consisting of a thousand works of art that are once again visible to the public by virtue of the agreement signed in February 2021 between the Municipality of Ivrea, the Olivetti Historical Archive, Tim and Olivetti.

From 7 pm the White Night of the book kicks off, involving the whole city with open shops, live music and above all meetings with writers. From 7pm to literary aperitifs. At 8.30 pm we go to dinner with the writers: in the restaurants of the city you can dine side by side with Beppe Fenoglio, whose centenary of his birth this year is celebrated.

Valentina Cervi

The word then passes to Natalia Ginzburg protagonist of The road that goes into the city (9.30 pm, courtyard of the Garda Museum). To give voice to the story Valentina Cervi in ​​a show directed by Iaia Forte. The show tells the story of a girl who chooses to have a wedding of interest, to take the road that goes to the city, only to realize that true love is elsewhere.