The Co-productions of Matera 2019

For almost three decades Japan has been cultivating a relationship of exchange with Europe, twinned year after year with the European capitals of culture. This was the basis for the photography project 'European Eyes on Japan': two European photographers, for 2019 the Italian Alessia Rollo and the Bulgarian Vladimir Pekov, were welcomed to an artistic residence to present the Japanese world from a different point of view. The photography exhibition, curated by Mikiko Kikuta, is flanked by two artistic installations by the artist Takashi Kuribayashi: the artist invites spectators to look beyond their immediate perception of objects and space to adopt a new perspective of the world how we see it.

With 'La Cavalleria Rusticana', Pietro Mascagni won a contest for young composers and immediately enjoyed great success in Italy and abroad. A fortunate story that, more than a century later, the Teatro San Carlo of Naples, in co-production with Matera 2019, replicates, creating a new way of putting together the show: thanks to the project 'Inhabiting the Opera' the city becomes an exceptional stage and its citizens are transformed into a choir whose voices joins those of the San Carlo, expressing all the pride of the community to be part of this event.

Co-creation and co-production are the two souls of the Matera 2019 programme. If half of the productions come from a collaboration between the Foundation and stakeholders from the local and international cultural scene, the other half is made up of projects carried out with Italian, European and international cultural institutions. In this panorama, Materadio occupies a special place: Rai Radio 3 was one of the first supporters of the Matera 2019 project. With great affection, this event returns every year to bring joy to the city and tell its story. This was especially true this year, where it was chosen to give a voice to 'I Sud', to the way that southerners see the contemporary world and their problems.

The chosen theme for Sponz Fest 2019 was ‘Sottaterra’ (Underground): if the society in which we live is only a representation of pretences, the alternative is the world of the underground, of darkness and fertility. In this anthropological investigation, Mariangela and Vinicio Capossela, with Matera 2019, brought the threnos, the Greek funeral lament, to southern Italy, creating a large procession that started from the island of Capo Rizzuto and passed through three regions, ending with the last fire in Matera, where it died down to the frenetic rhythms of music from Capossela himself.

A story of redemption, that of the European Capital of Culture, which is also relived through the narrative of the Teatro delle Albe of Ravenna, which presented here Dante's 'Purgatory', the second part of "The Divine Comedy 2017-2021' co-produced by Ravenna Festival and the Alighieri Theatre. Ermanna Montanari and Marco Martinelli, artistic directors of the show, presented Purgatory as the canticle of beginning again, of the 'we', of the choirs singing their own joy, of ascending together.