La distanza della Luna opens the Taormina Arte summer season at the Greek Theater tonight. This performance is part of the theatrical program directed for the second consecutive year by Pompeo Oliva.
Since 1983 the evocative setting of the Greek Theater has hosted the Taormina Arte, an extraordinary dance, theater and music event.
Technorati Tags [ taormina | taormina arte | greek theater | sicily ]
For its 2008 summer collection, Giorgio Armani looks to Sicily for inspiration. “Sicily is part of a world I’ve always loved,” says Armani, who has a summer home on the island of Pantelleria.
Armani highlights the Mediterranean mystery, from the salty sexiness of a fisherman to the genteel sophistication of Sicilian nobility. Symbols such as volcanoes, temples and mosaics were projected on a screen at the end of the runway.
Until Armani’s dip into that part of the Mediterranean, Dolce & Gabbana seemed to have the exclusive on Sicilian style, particularly with Domenico Dolce drawing inspiration from his years growing up as a child near Palermo.
Read more at IHT
Technorati Tags [ armani | sicily | dolce & gabbana | palermo | mediterranean | sicilian style ]
Michael Roberts’ “Shot in Sicily” new book goes on sale at the Armani stores today. I have to admit that the title made me extremely curious. I know that there are certain Sicilian traits and behaviors that really attract foreigners. It is like a stigma for us Sicilians: no matter what we do, we will always be seen in a certain way. I cannot comment much on the book since I have not seen it, but the ambiguity of the title and the clarity of the cover say a lot… Will the book portrait the usual stereotypical Sicily? We’ll see.
More on the book:
Spanning two decades, the 186-page book, published by Edition 7L, traces the stylist and photographer’s shifting vision of a sensual and ambiguous country via 50 color and 127 black and white photographs, with an occasional nod to Baron Wilhelm von Gloeden’s late nineteenth-century images of the Sicilian town of Taormina and the films of Visconti and Bolognini. In lieu of capturing images of the fashion set, Roberts turned his camera on such visually stunning still life as crumbling temples, traditional Easter parades, and the theater of daily life. The $55 monograph is designed by Roberts and features an epilogue by Manolo Blahnik and text by Amanda Harlech.
Technorati Tags [ sicily | michael roberts | shot in sicily | armani stores | manolo blahnik | amanda harlech ]
Foreign travelers love Sicily mainly for its sea, cultural heritage, food and wine experience and the friendliness of its people according to Doxa, Mercury and Touring Servizi. International tour operators praise the steps forwards taken in the last few years and ask for more promotional activities. However, they point the finger against the structural limitations of the Sicilian travel industry: higher than average costs, poorly trained staff, lack of tourist information and environmental carelessness. If these issues are tackled, tourism to the region could gain a greater market share and reduce its seasonality.
Technorati Tags [ sicily | sicilian tourism | foreign travel to sicily ]
It is emergency in Sicily now. According to ANSA, temperatures soared to above 40 degrees Celsius for (104 degrees Fahrenheit) the fourth day running with blackouts in Palermo and other cities caused by overheated cables and a spike in energy consumption fuelled by the use of air conditioning. Blackouts knocked out traffic lights in Palermo creating chaos on the city’s roads.
Hospital services were also affected by the outages with health officials warning that only emergency operations could be guaranteed. Electricity company Enel subsequently decided to ration power on the island, resorting to staged power cuts on a rota basis which it said would last until night set in. The company said it would continue this system until the end of the heat wave, which weathermen said would ease on Wednesday.
Sicilian emergency services, meanwhile, were flooded with calls from people feeling ill from the heat or reporting fires. Concern was mounting in a mountainous area to the northwest of Palermo where a huge fire was spreading under strong winds. Firefighters battled six other blazes near the Sicilian capital including one at Termini Imerese where automaker Fiat has a plant. Fiat closed down its factory after smoke from the fires penetrated the inside of the building.
The fire also came dangerously close to a local railway line and a major power plant, which had to be shut down. Several villas in the area were evacuated. Another major fire caused damage to a dozen homes near Cefalu’ on the north Sicilian coast. Farmers’ union Coldiretti said fire had damaged at least 1,000 hectares of grain crops across the island.
Source: ANSA
Technorati Tags [ sicily | scorching temperature | catania | blackouts in palermo | Fiat | fire | Cefalu’ ]
Catania Province - says its president, Raffaele Lombardo - could attract up to two million tourists in 2007. Last years’ numbers show a growing interest among international travelers:
France 81,111 arrivals
Germany 79,115 arrivals
USA 74,777 arrivals
Spain 60,486 arrivals
The new airport, new routes from numerous international destinations and more “all inclusive” packages will be promoted consistently to generate demand in these travel markets and help meeting the ambitious goal of two million arrivals in 2007.
Technorati Tags [ catania | catania tourism | raffaele lombardo ]
Sicily and Calabria registered higher-than-average temperatures over the weekend, with peaks of 45 degrees Celsius (113 degrees Fahrenheit) recorded in Catania, a city in Sicily.
Higher-than-average temperatures of around 38 degrees were also recorded in Florence, Rome and Naples on Sunday and were expected to remain high until the middle of this week.
Italy’s civil protection officials have sounded the alarm in the country’s southern cities amid concerns that this summer could be the hottest since 2003, when scores of elderly people passed away because of the heat.
Researchers in Rome, meanwhile, have found that the Mediterranean Sea has hit its highest temperatures in 22 years, with average temperatures in the Adriatic Sea peaking at 4 degrees above average in mid-May.
Source: Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Technorati Tags [ sicily | catania | italy ]
After signing Santa Teresa Resort in Pantelleria this past April, design hotels™ adds a new member to its portfolio in Sicily: Falconara Charming House & Resort, Butera. design hotels™ represents and markets a hand-picked collection of more than 150 hotels in over 40 countries across the globe. Established in 1993, as the first of its kind, the company offers unparalleled specialist knowledge from conceptual branding through to market trend consultancy and international representation.
Falconara Charming House & Resort – Butera, Sicily, Italy
The resort overlooks the Mediterranean from on high in two remarkable buildings: “La Fattoria” has 25 rooms and is the former dependence to the nearby medieval castle. The sleek newly built “Club House” boasts a restaurant, bar, boutique, and 39 rooms in addition to the utmost in spa facilities. Throughout, stone and wood are the dominant materials, allowing the Sicilian atmosphere to take hold. More>
Santa Teresa Resort – Pantelleria, Sicily, Italy
Set amid bucolic vineyards, olive trees and lush flora, the resort is a collection of 18 restored dammusi – ancient local buildings of cut stone. Clustered in four mini-villages each bungalow-style dammuso features alcoves or galleries incorporated into its sleek modern design, and accommodates 2-4 people. The three pools and Arabian garden are also tranquil spots from which to take in the beautiful scenery. More>
Technorati Tags [ sicily | design hotels | Falconara Charming House & Resort | Santa Teresa Resort | Pantelleria | Butera ]
The Tunisian movie “Making of” by Nouri Bouzid wins the 53rd edition of the Taormina FilmFest. Lofti Abdelli, protagonist of the movie, is awarded as best actor. Bouzid, well-known in France, is interested in showing that Arabs do not like terrorism, contrary to the general Western belief.
Best Movie
“Making of” by Nouri Bouzid
Best Actor
Lofti Abdelli in “Making of”
Best Director
David Volach for “My Father, My Lord”
Best Writing
Stefano Incerti, Salvatore Parlagreco, Heidrun Schleef for “L”Uomo di Vetro”
Best Short Film
Francesco Cannavà for “Red Line”
Technorati Tags [ taormina filmfest | taormina | lofti abdelli | david volach | Stefano Incerti | Salvatore Parlagreco | Heidrun Schleef | Francesco Cannavà | Nouri Bouzid ]
Maybe things are really changing for Sicily. It is extremely rare that foreign press writes articles like this one appeared on the Times Online today.
According to the British publication, the days of sleeping with the fishes are all but gone. Francis Ford Coppola’s cliché Sicilian Mafioso, with flat cap, starched white shirt and a shotgun slung over his shoulder, is finally fading to black. Sicily is slowly coming to terms with its tumultuous past, with the infamous Cosa Nostra being only one set of actors on a very crowded stage.
For centuries this craggy volcanic outcrop was the most important piece of real estate in the Mediterranean. It has been witness to the rise and fall of countless empires, from the Carthaginians, to the Greeks and Romans, to the Arabs, Normans and Spanish. It was often said, “To control Sicily, meant to control the Mediterranean.”
Today, the likes of author Mario Puzo’s jowly fictional character Don Corelone would be surprised to discover their hard-won strongholds are being turned over to holiday guests. Many of the estates once run by powerful godfathers like Toto Riina are now agro-tourism businesses where organisations like the collective Libera Terra – Free Land – have been putting confiscated mafia land to socially useful purposes since 1995. […]
Read more of the article at the Times Online.
Technorati Tags [ sicily | mafia | sicilian tourism | times online | mario puzo | don corleone | toto riina | francis ford coppola ]
The Taormina Film Festival is almost at its end. The 53rd Taormina Film Fest, held in the magnificent Sicilian coastal town from June 16 to 22, turned the page this summer with a new director and a new program this year.
The festival, made famous by world-renowned guests from Elizabeth Taylor to Tom Cruise, Lana Turner to Quentin Tarantino to name a few, represents a special meeting point for the cinema, filmmakers and producers of the Mediterranean.
Each year it turns the spotlight on a different Mediterranean country whose current production is of particular interest. This year the focus went on the exciting new developments taking place in Egypt and the emergence of major new producers on the international scene, in the presence of some of the greatest stars of the Arab world, as the Egyptian actress Youssra (in the picture).
To see some pictures of the 2007 edition of the festival please visit http://www.taorminafilmfest.it/2007/english/gallery/default.asp
Technorati Tags [ Youssra | taormina film festival | taormina | sicily ]
Sicily Guide now offers the possibility to book your own tour in Sicily on the Internet thanks to a new partnership with the San Francisco-based online company Viator. Sicily Guide is also proud to partner with Amazon.com and Wine.com and list some of Sicily high quality products, such as: gourmet food, ceramics and Sicilian wines.
Technorati Tags [ sicily guide store | sicilian gourmet products | sicilian wines ]
Antonio Vultaggio, the last surviving producer of handmade fishnets in Sicily — and perhaps in Italy — has died at 78. Born into a family of fishnet weavers, Vultaggio had spent his entire life after age 5 creating fishnets by hand, and his death represents the end of the historical trade in the region.
While creating handmade fishnets was once the norm throughout Italy, an influx of factory-made nets in the 1970s meant the craft was no longer a necessity. Vultaggio even tried to work at one of the factories that produced the nets during the late 1980s.
Ultimately, the tradesman gave up his job in the Sicilian town of Mazara del Vallo, citing the lengthy commute from his home in the city of Trapani. ”I’m an old guy, a creature of habit. Maybe if I was 20 years younger I would have stuck it out,” he said at the time.
Source: ANSA
Technorati Tags [ antonio vultaggio | mazara del vallo | handmade fishnet | sicily ]
This is interesting news. I wonder if it is related to the healthy culinary traditions of Southern Italy… Researchers in Italy say they’ve found a cholesterol-blocking gene in three southern Italian families. The families, from Sicily and Calabria, are the first white bearers of the gene.
Maurizio Averna of Palermo University said the discovery may help scientists find new ways of keeping cholesterol low and averting heart disease. The study was published by the American Heart Association.
Source: ANSA
Technorati Tags [ sicily | cholesterol-blocking gene | maurizio averna | university of Palermo ]
In its basic outline the story told in “Golden Door,” Emanuele Crialese’s beautiful dream of a film, is hardly unfamiliar. Some version of this immigrant’s tale — setting out from the old country, crossing the Atlantic in steerage, arriving at Ellis Island — is part of the family history of millions of Americans. But what makes Mr. Crialese’s telling unusual, apart from the gorgeousness of his wide-screen compositions, is that his emphasis is on departure and transition, rather than arrival.
His film takes its English title from the Emma Lazarus poem about the Statue of Liberty, but the lady in the harbor, like the rest of America (apart from Ellis Island), remains unseen as the director takes us up to the door but not through it. The Italian title, “Nuovomondo,” means “new world,” but this too is a bit misleading. It is the Old World that dominates this chronicle of Italian peasants striking out for a future they can barely imagine, and the achievement of the movie is to immerse the modern viewer in a way of perceiving the world that has nearly been forgotten. You may have looked at stiff, yellowing pictures of ancestors from a century ago and wondered what they thought and felt, and it is this kind of curiosity that “Golden Door” comes remarkably close to satisfying.
In the days before aviation the physical distance between rural Italy and New York City was vaster than it is now, but “Golden Door” is as much about time travel as it is about the geographical kind. Salvatore Mancuso (Vincenzo Amato) and his family effectively live in the Middle Ages, cut off from nearly every manifestation of modernity. When Salvatore strikes up conversations below decks, he is startled to learn that people from other villages speak a common language.
Illiterate and superstitious, he is first enticed to embark on the journey by crude postcards that show America as a place where giant coins grow on bushes, where onions are as big as donkey carts and chickens as big as donkeys. And when he must make that decision, Salvatore scrambles up a craggy hill with a stone in his mouth, laying it down at the shrine of a saint whose supernatural counsel he seeks.
The actual America, which is to say Ellis Island, is shown as a place of rigorous but not altogether malignant bureaucratic procedure, where the new arrivals are subjected to physical and psychological tests meant to determine their fitness. (Arranging differently shaped blocks in a rectangular tray does not seem inherently more rational than carrying a stone up a hill in your mouth.) There is also a decorous if somewhat creepy marriage market, where bachelors who have established themselves in America offer themselves — and legal status — to women from back home.
The film does not patronize Salvatore, who is brave, dignified and clever as well as unlettered. He gathers his grandmother, his son and his brother (who does not speak and may not be able to hear) along with two young mail-order brides from the village and does his best to protect them all on their journey.
Before boarding the boat they encounter an Englishwoman named Lucy Peters (Charlotte Gainsbourg), whose air of almost aristocratic refinement stands in striking contrast to their rough rusticity. Why this delicate, entitled creature should be joining the wretched refuse is never explained (though an American immigration official does note that it’s unusual to find an Englishwoman in a boatload of Italians), a decision that contributes to the film’s mysterious, almost magical atmosphere.
The wary infatuation that begins to flicker between Lucy and Salvatore provides a lovely note of romance, and the sentimentality that inevitably infuses a story like this rarely feels soft or overwrought. There is fear and confusion on the faces of the travelers, but also expectation and wonder. And even if we know, more or less, what lies in store for them — their children will be our parents and grandparents after all — we can’t help but share in their feeling of anticipation.
“Golden Door” is rated PG-13 (Parents strongly cautioned). There is some brief nudity.
Source: New York Times
Technorati Tags [ golden door | emanuele crialese | nuovo mondo ]
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