At the International Museum of the Mask Amleto and Donato Sartori in Abano Terme, the exhibition “The Conquest of Freedom” continues successfully with masks, sculptures, sketches, and testimonies dedicated to Gianfranco de Bosio and the art of the Sartori. The exhibition has been realized in collaboration with the MIC, the University of Padua, the Theatre and Melodrama Institute of the Cini Foundation, the National Committee for the Centenary Celebrations of Gianfranco de Bosio, with the patronage of the Municipality of Abano Terme and the Province of Padua.
Gianfranco de Bosio, one of the most representative figures of the revival of post-war Italian theatre, actively participates in the Resistance with a group of anti-fascist university professors from Padua. During his prolific career, especially focused between 1947 and 1952, Gianfranco de Bosio, together with Diego Valeri, Manara Valgimigli, Concetto Marchesi, Amleto Sartori, Jacques Lecoq, Misha Scandella, and Giulio Bosetti, realizes about forty-six productions of mostly unpublished works. Through his performances, he introduces the theatre of Ruzante; he directs the first productions of works by Bertolt Brecht, brings hundreds of Italian and international authors to the stage; from Aeschylus to Machiavelli, from Molière to Jean-Paul Sartre, from Dario Fo to Primo Levi, and many others.
The diffusion of Ruzantian works and the masks of Commedia dell'Arte is the artistic signature that characterized the early work of Gianfranco de Bosio, alongside the efforts of Amleto Sartori, who during those years had undertaken significant studies on theatrical masks. Those of Commedia dell'Arte, the Neutral Mask for Jacques Lecoq of Greek Tragedy for Jean Louis Barrault. “They are not silent and empty masks, they are not relics of vanished civilizations, but eloquent masks according to reason and not according to ritual, because they develop a discourse that is simultaneously creative and critical,” emphasized Giovanni Calendoli when speaking about Amleto Sartori.
Opening hours: Tuesday: 9.00-13.30; Wednesday and Friday: 9.00-13.00 / 14.30-18.00; Sunday: 14.00-17.00. Other days by appointment. Closed on national holidays.
