THE HERITAGE OF THE FESTIVAL‍

Since 2021, the historical heritage of the Foundation Festival dei Due Mondi, has been the subject of a major recovery and enhancement work. The cataloguing and restoration of documents, photographs, period sketches, costumes and stage furnishings make it possible to tell the story of a theatrical journey spanning more than 60 years. The first stage of this extraordinary work has brought back to life more than 3,000 costumes, each bearing witness to an era when every stage costume was made to by hand.

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ON tracks BY GIAN CARLO MENOTTI‍

The recovery of historical and artistic heritage fuels an exhibition route that each year traces to stages through the history of Festival dei Due Mondi, through the visions and brilliant insights of its founder Gian Carlo Menotti. Through the display of costumes, posters, prop material, sketches and period photographs, On the tracks of Gian Carlo Menotti outlines an itinerary that highlights a human and professional portrait of Maestro Menotti. Thanks to the work of Piero Maccarinelli, who curated the exhibition at Palazzo Collicola. Fragments of a theatrical journey and, to to follow, the exhibition Menotti's Years 1958-1998 at the Via Saffi exhibition spaces, with the collaboration of Monica Trevisani, it was possible to restore to the public the value of unpublished testimonies, stage costumes, historical sketches and films of the period. This work is now enriched with new elements such as the outfits of theopera The Cunning Fox of 1998, recovered and displayed to the public at the inaugural concert conducted from Jakub Hrůša.

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The project. The dream workshop. Symbology and art of theatrical costume conceived by costume historian Fabiana Giacomotti is inspired byopera Pelléas et Mélisande to present, at the foyer of the Teatro Nuovo Gian Carlo Menotti, a comparative exhibition of some important stagings of Claude Debussy's famous opera , as well as to a calendar of meetings and a theatrical tailoring workshop open to the public at the Cloister of San Nicolò.

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The exhibition tour continues with the Festival dei Due Mondi Documentation Center at Casa Menotti, a "treasure chest of memory" that gives form and context to the audio, video and photographic materials of the Festival, and the Giosuè Carducci Municipal Library, which holds the original Festival dei Due Mondi materials from 1958 to the present.