Showing posts with label University of Siena. Show all posts
Showing posts with label University of Siena. Show all posts

27 January 2019

Roberto Paci Dalò – composer and film maker

Music maker coined the definition ‘media dramaturgy’


Roberto Paci Dalò has composed and directed more than  30 groundbreaking music-theatre works
Roberto Paci Dalò has composed and directed more than
30 groundbreaking music-theatre works
The award-winning contemporary musician and composer Roberto Paci Dalò was born on this day in 1962 in Rimini.

Paci Dalò is the co-founder and director of the performing arts ensemble Giardini Pensili and has composed music for theatre, radio, television and film.

After completing musical, visual and architectural studies in Fiesole, Faenza and Ravenna, Paci Dalò focused on sound and design and their use in film, theatre and collaborative projects.

He has been a pioneer in the use of digital technologies and telecommunication systems in art and has been particularly interested in performing arts as a meeting point of languages.

Since 1985 he has written, composed and directed more than 30 groundbreaking music-theatre works which have been presented worldwide.

Roberto Paci Dalò has worked at some of Italy's leading universities
Roberto Paci Dalò has worked at some
of Italy's leading universities
Paci Dalò has composed music for acoustical ensembles, electronics and voices and has produced radio works for the main European broadcasting corporations.

His films and videos have been regularly presented in international festivals.

Paci Dalò taught Media Dramaturgy at the University of Siena and collaborates with institutions such as the University of Bologna, University of Rome, University of Ascoli Piceno and the Brera Fine Arts Academy in Milan, where he develops projects in collaboration with designers, architects, planners, artists, programmers and hackers.

He coined the term ‘media dramaturgy’ - an extension of the study of composition of drama and adapting stories to actable form to cover not only the theatre but radio, television and film - in describing his own work.

He has been internationally acclaimed for leading the way in multimedia.

As a performer he has also developed extended techniques on the clarinet and with electronics.

Paci Dalò currently lives and works in the hills above Rimini.

The 13th century Tempio Maletestiano in Rimini has frescoes by Piero della Francesca and works by Giotto
The 13th century Tempio Maletestiano in Rimini has
frescoes by Piero della Francesca and works by Giotto
Travel tip:

With wide sandy beaches and plenty of hotels and restaurants, Rimini is one of the most popular seaside resorts in Europe, but it is also a historic town with many interesting things to see. The Tempio Maletestiano is a 13th century Gothic church originally built for the Fransiscans that was transformed on the outside in the 15th century and decorated inside with frescoes by Piero della Francesca and works by Giotto and many other artists. In 1993 Paci Dalò conceived the project Publiphono for his native town, using the public address system of the beach at Rimini to create environmental audio performances along 15km (9 miles) of the coast.


The Piazza della Libertà in the centre of Faenza, the city
in Emilia Romagna where Paci Dalò studied
Travel tip:

Paci Dalò studied at Faenza, a city about 72km (45 miles) kilometres northwest of Rimini, which is famous for the manufacture of a type of decorative majolica-ware known as faience. It is also home to the International Museum of Ceramics, which has examples of ceramics from ancient times, the Middle Ages and the 18th and 19th centuries as well as displaying work by important contemporary artists. The museum is in Viale Baccarini in Faenza. For more information visit www.micfaenza.org

More reading:

The unique style of contemporary composer Ludovico Einaudi

The Futurist artist who invented 'noise music'

How Luigi Nono used avant-garde music as a means of political expression

Also on this day:

98AD: Trajan becomes Roman Emperor

1901: The death of Giuseppe Verdi

1927: The birth of novelist Giovanni Arpino


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25 January 2018

Paolo Mascagni – physician

Scientist was first to map the human lymphatic system


Paolo Mascagni studied geology before turning to human science and anatomy
Paolo Mascagni studied geology before turning
to human science and anatomy
The physician Paolo Mascagni, whose scientific research enabled him to create the first map of the complete human lymphatic system, was born on this day in 1755 in Pomarance, a small town in Tuscany about 40km (25 miles) inland from the western coastline.

Mascagni described his findings in a book with detailed illustrations of every part of the lymphatic system he had identified, which was to prove invaluable to physicians wanting to learn more about a part of the human body vital to the regulation of good health.

He also commissioned the sculptor Clemente Susini to create a full-scale model in wax of the lymphatic system, which can still be seen at the Museum of Human Anatomy at the University of Bologna.

Later he created another significant tome, his Anatomia Universa, which comprises 44 enormous copperplate illustrations that set out to bring together in one book the full extent of human knowledge about the anatomy of the human body.  The ‘book’ in the event was so large it was never bound, each plate measuring more than 3ft 6ins (1.07m) by 2ft 6ins (0.76m), designed in such a way that those from the same plane of dissection can be placed together and show the whole body in life size.

Mascagni was the son of Aurelio Mascagni and Elisabetta Burroni, both belonging to ancient noble families from Chiusdino, a village in the province of Siena.

An illustration from Mascagni's celebrated book on the human lymphatic system
An illustration from Mascagni's celebrated
book on the human lymphatic system
He studied at the University of Siena, where his teacher of anatomy was Pietro Tabarrini, and graduated in philosophy and medicine in 1771. By his final year, he had been appointed assistant to Tabarrini and succeeded his mentor as Professor of Anatomy after blindness forced him to retire.

As a young man, Mascagni had been keen on geology and wrote a number of papers on the thermal springs of Siena and Volterra. Later, he would successfully identify boric acid in the waters and suggest ways to produce from it the industrial compound now known as borax.

After graduating, his focus turned to the human lymphatic system, feeling that he owed it to Tabarrini to do what he could to advance his teacher’s research into the workings of the human body. He decided that he would not work in clinical medicine but devote himself entirely to teaching and research.

His work was interrupted for a while by the political upheaval of the late 18th century, when Tuscany was occupied by the French. He became involved in politics somewhat reluctantly, becoming Superintendent of the Arts, Sciences and Charitable Institutions of Siena, and this placed him in constant conflict with the French authorities over their seizing of personal and public property.

Unfortunately, his involvement with the French was misinterpreted when Austria regained control of the area. Accused of having Jacobin sympathies, he was arrested and imprisoned for seven months.

The statue of Mascagni in the courtyard of the Uffizi in Florence, where he lived
The statue of Mascagni in the courtyard of the
Uffizi in Florence, where he lived for some years
On his release, he was appointed a professor of anatomy at the University of Pisa and began lecturing at the Hospital of Santa Maria Nuova in Florence before becoming a full professor at the University of Florence.

In his research into the lymphatic system, Mascagni perfected a technique whereby he injected mercury as a contrast medium into the peripheral lymphatic networks of a human cadaver and by following the mercury’s flow to other parts of the system was able to produce detailed diagrams and models.

This brought him fame all over Europe, yet he did not limit himself to merely describing the anatomy of the lymphatic system.  By his research into its physiology and pathology he was able to highlight its importance in fighting disease in the human body, the understanding of which helped in the evolution of new treatments.

Mascagni died in 1815 during a stay at his estate in Castelletto, near Chiusdino, the village near Siena where his family originated and where he spent most of his free time. He had contracted a pernicious fever, probably malaria.

His memory has been commemorated in several ways. The street where he was born in Pomerance is now called Via Paolo Mascagni; the hamlet where the family lived, 33km (20 miles) southwest of Siena, is now known as Castelletto Mascagni, and there is another Via Paolo Mascagni in nearby Chiusdino.

A statue of Paolo Mascagni can be found in a niche in the courtyard of the Uffizi in Florence, as one of the great men of Tuscany.  His house in Florence was in Via Fiesolana.  There is also a monument to him in the Accademia dei Fisiocritici in Siena, of which he was president.

One of the medieval gates into the town of Pomarance
One of the medieval gates into the town of Pomarance
Travel tip:

The town of Pomarance, where Mascagni was born, sits on a hill overlooking Val di Cecina, on the border between the provinces of Pisa, 80km (50 miles) to the north, and Siena, 69km (43 miles) to the east. The main square, Piazza de Larderel, is named after Francois Jacques de Lardarel, a 19th century French engineer who worked in the area on the exploitation of geothermal energy from the steam emitted by lagoons in the area.

The ancient village of Chiusdino occupies a hilltop position
The ancient village of Chiusdino occupies a hilltop position
Travel tip:

The ancient village of Chiusdino dates back to the seventh or eighth century, when it was a Longobard settlement, sitting on the top of a hill, surrounded by walls. Much of the history of the town surrounds the legend of San Galgano, who was an arrogant, licentious son of a local feudal lord in the 12th century who changed his ways after a supposed visit from Saint Michael the Archangel, who told him he must give up his excesses, prompting Galgano to say it would be easier to cut a rock with a sword. As if to prove it, he launched a sword thrust at a rock and was amazed when the blade plunged into the rock as easily as a knife into butter. He knelt to pray and vowed to become a hermit. The sword in the rock remains on display in a chapel, the Rotonda della Spada, that was built around it.