Wednesday 23 June 2010

• VILLAS OF THE VENETO - CLAUDIA DANIOTTI
• The Veneto region has been for centuries the favourite "summer resort" of the Most Serene Republic of Venice. Between the 16th and the 18th century, more than 4,000 villas were built for Venice's patricians, providing them with the perfect setting to ride, hunt, cultivate the lands and relax, far away from the claustrophobic capital. Mirrored in the Brenta Canal, dotting the countryside or overlooking the valleys from the top of the hills, these grand palaces were enhanced by fountains and gardens and decorated with beautiful frescoes. Claudia Daniotti, who was born and grew up in the Veneto, lead us in a fascinating journey into these outstanding beauties of her native land. 

Wednesday 19 May 2010

• ITALIAN OPERA HITS - KATY BINGHAM
• We were enchanted with a selection of favourite and tuneful operatic arias performed live. These were be punctuated by nuggets of information to set the scene in the drama and to highlight other intriguing details: which Italian heroine won her suitor by threatening to make a splash, which monarch serenaded his trees, and whose gourmet dish would horrify a healthy eater!

Wednesday 17 April 2010

• THE ITALIANS IN CLERKENWELL - AUBREY KNOWLES
• We were delighted to welcome Aubrey Knowles of the Anglo-Italian Family History Society. Illustrating his talk with historical photographs and maps, Aubrey spoke about the immigrant Italian community that settled in Clerkenwell, East London, at the turn of the 19^th Century. His great grandfather was one of them; he was an engineer and worked for the Daily Telegraph in Fleet Street. The Italians turned their hands to a variety of skilled and unskilled jobs such as ice-cream making, furniture importing and spectacle manufacturing. Alongside respectable businessmen there was a notorious mob of criminals known as the Santorini Gang. The area became known as Little Italy and the Italian community was instrumental in the building of St Peter’s Roman Catholic Church. They maintained their links with home by keeping festivals such as the feast of the Madonna of Carmelo every July and with street processions and 'beating the bounds'. 

Wednesday 17 March 2010

• I MIEI ANNI RACONTANO ROMA DAL 1972 AD OGGI - BARBARA CORTI
• In her first ‘discorso’ to the Southend AngloItalian Circle, Barbara Corti gave an enchanting account of life in the Eternal City.  Barbara was born in Rome and had the unique privilege of being baptized in St Peter’s!  After attending the world famous La Sapienza University, she eventually moved to the U.K. but her heart is obviously still in her native city.  Barbara illustrated her talk with photos of her family and the hidden corners of Rome, as well as the famous sites.  She mixed family anecdotes with stories of Roman life in a fascinating and lively talk. 

Wednesday 17th February 2010

• IL CIELO SOPRA DI NOI: L'ASTROLOGIA E L'ARTE ITALIANA - CLAUDIA DANIOTTI
• We were delighted to welcome art historian,Claudia Daniotti, on a return visit. Claudia gave a fascinating talk in Italian on the depiction of the sun, moon, stars, planets and signs of the zodiac as depicted in numerous paintings, sculptures, works of art and buildings such as the Doges Palace in Venice and the Parthenon in Athens. With a wealth of illustrations and drawing on tales from Greek Mythology, the Roman Gods and Christian symbols, Claudia had her audience entranced. 

Wednesday 20th January 2010

• I MIEI ANNI RACONTANO ROMA DAL 1972 AD OGGI - BARBARA CORTIUNA SERATA DI DIVERTIMENTI CON ANNA MARIA E GABRIELLA
• Members of the Southend Anglo Italian Circle enjoyed a great start tothe new year.  Annamaria Baker &Gabriella McGhee presented a fun evening of 'divertimenti', putting members' knowledgeof Italian history, geography, language, culture & general knowledge to thetest with some light-hearted quizzes and story telling. This was followed by ashort AGM when the Committee Members presented their reports on the past year'sactivities and were unanimously re-elected. 

Wednesday 18th November 2009

• SERATA A TEMA LIBERO
• Italian Circle members were delighted to welcomepopular local teacher, Pietro Urso, who hosted an evening of questions anddiscussion on various aspects of life in Italy. A wide variety of topics wascovered ranging from the place of the bicycle in Italy today (second only tofootball!) to ’imprecazione’  and ofcourse the evergreen subject of the Italian mafia which took in, on the way,tax evasion and the meaning of Bella Figura. Pietro concluded with a stoutdefence of Italian television. All this drew input from members leading to somelively discussion.

Wednesday 21st October 2009

• ITALIANS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM
• Giovanni spoke in Italian about the journey made byItalian émigrés to the UK early in the 20^th Century and theirinitial shock at the grey skies and cold weather that met them. Focussingparticularly on the Italian community in Ipswich, he illustrated the type of work they undertook – not onlyselling Italian ice cream, but also knife grinding, fortune telling and walkingthe streets playing the barrel organ – with some fascinating photographs. Manyof the Italian immigrants to Ipswich came from the Campania region and wereemployed in the Cranes Textiles business. Giovanni went on to discuss howItalians living in the UK maintained their own cultural traditions.  Today, Italian food is widely available buta century ago even spaghetti was a rarity! Giovanni concluded his talk with examples of how Italian culture, fromfootball’s Fabio Capelli to films, food, the Estorick Art Gallery and thespecialist Italian Book shop in London, now permeates life in the UK. 

Wednesday 23rd September 2009

• Sadly for the large audience at the Southend Anglo-ItalianCircle meeting on Wednesday 23^rd September, the proposedpresentation on the Villas and Gardens of Umbria had to be postponed due tolast minute technical difficulties. However Tina Geraldi and Pietro Urso stepped into the breach leading afascinating discussion in Italian prompted by questions from the floor. Topicsranged from the dialects spoken in the various regions of Italy, the history ofthe unification of Italy, its politics and economics and the ongoingdifferences between the peoples of the north and south of the country.

Wednesday 18th June 2009

• AN EVENING OF MUSIC WITH ELIZABETH UPSHER
• Members were treated to a delightful summer’s ‘Evening of Music’. Well known local soprano, Elizabeth Upsher, played and sang a variety of popular music including arias from Madame Butterfly and La Boheme, evergreen favourites such as Pie Jesu and Panis Angelicus and several enchanting songs by Mozart and Handel. The evening was rounded off with the native Italians in the audience joining Elizabeth in such well known songs as Santa Lucia and O Sole Mio.

Wednesday 20th May 2009

• THE ESTORICK COLLECTION OF MODERN ITALIAN ART IN LONDON
• Claudia Daniotti, an Education Assistant at the Estorick Gallery in London, spoke in Italian about the founding of the Gallery by Erick Estorick in the second half of the 20th Century and then went on to speak about some of the Italian Futuristic works of art displayed in the gallery, illustrated by a slide show.

Wednesday 22nd March 2009

• MY LANDLADY AND HOW TRIESTE BECAME PART OF UNIFIED ITALY
• A lecture in Italian by Trevor Joscelyne
• Trevor Joscelyne talked in Italian about his days as a young man working for the British Council in Milan in 1971/72, when he lodged with an elderly widow born and bred in Trieste. He recounted many interesting tales and anecdotes of the lady’s memories of Trieste before and during World War I and rounded off his talk with a short presentation of old photographs of the buildings and people of Trieste.

Wednesday 18th March 2009

• Unfortunately Tina Geraldi was unwell and unable to give her talk on the villas and gardens of Umbria. Pietro Urso stepped in at the 11th hour sparked a lively ‘discussione’ on topics ranging from the creeping of English words into the Italian language to the power of the Mafia. A very successful evening!

Wednesday 18th February 2009

• GRANDFATHER’S MEMORIES AS A POLICEMAN IN SICILY IN THE SEVENTIES
• An illustrated lecture in Italian by Josie Nicastro
• Members were enthralled with tales in Italian of law student Josie’s Nonno (Grandfather) who spent fifty years with the Carabinieri working under cover and with the judiciary against the renowned Sicilian Mafia. Josie illustrated her talk with photos including one showing her Grandfather being presented with the Gold Medal for Services to the Italian State.

Wednesday 21st January 2009

• THE NEW FIAT CINQUECENTO
• The newly designed, ground-breaking Fiat Cinquecento was the subject of a most interesting and informative presentation in English given by Jason Saunders to members of the Southend Anglo-Italian Circle on Wednesday 21^st January. Jason gave a brief history of the Italian Fiat Motor Company which was founded in 1899 and talked about the first Fiat 500 which was produced after the end of the Second World War. He outlined the revolutionary design features of the new Fiat Cinquecento which illustrate the unique talent of the Italians for style and utility. Several members of the Circle took up Jason’s offer to view and sit in a new Fiat Cinquecento which he had parked outside the meeting hall.  The talk was followed by a brief AGM with refreshments and panettone.

Wednesday 19th November 2008

• BUT WHERE ARE ALL THE TOURISTS?
• An illustrated lecture in Italian
• Sheila Stokes talked to us in Italian about the countryside and the villages of Piedmont, a region well known to her but that is little visited by English tourists.

Wednesday 22nd October 2008

• ITALIAN CINEMA
• Illustrated lecture in Italian by Giovanni Gravina
• Giovanni gave an extremely interesting and well received, illustrated talk in Italian about the rise of the Italian Cinema industry at the time of World War II, its decline during the 1970s and the present day renaissance.  Accompanied by illustrations he gave brief biographies of such famous directors as De Laurentiis, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Michelangelo Antonioni, Francesca Archibugi and Federico Fellini and covered a whole spectrum of films from Neorealism (Mamma Roma) to Comedy (Divorce Italian Style), Thrillers and of course, Sergio Leone’s famous 'Spaghetti Westerns' (A Fistful of Dollars, For A Few Dollars More, etc.)

Wednesday 24th September 2008

• FUN EVENING
• Anna-Maria Baker and Gabriella McGhee hosted a fun evening encouraging members to talk in Italian with a light-hearted quiz involving history, geography, music and cooking.  The evening started with an invitation to members to try out some Italian tongue-twisters and concluded with tea and coffee together with a slice of panettone. A very successful and entertaining evening!

Wednesday 18th June 2008

• PUCCINI 150
• Illustrated lecture in English by Andrew Rothwell
• A celebration of the life and music of Giacomo Puccini in the 150th anniversary year of his birth.

Wednesday 21st May 2008

• THE SECRET ANIMALS OF ROME
• Illustrated lecture in Italian by Tina Geraldi
• An unusual, almost secret, tour through a Rome in which everything is there to be discovered. This city conceals stories great and small in which the main characters are animals. We walked through alleys and squares to discover some of those little animals; some hidden in a stone, some in the cornice of an antique building, some in a private courtyard. Cats, snakes, tortoises, insects, all with a story to tell, sometimes bizarre, sometimes forgotten, but always worth discovering.

Wednesday 23rd April 2008

• THE MEDICI: BANKERS, POLITICIANS, POPES AND PATRONS
• Illustrated lecture in Italian by James Gilpin
• James looked at the development of the Medici family during the 15th and 16th centuries and how they managed to survive two periods in exile from Florence and then establish themselves as hereditary rulers for another two hundred years. He explained how they rose to prominence within the Catholic Church and then married into the French royal family, legitimising their authority over Florence and how this was reinforced through artistic patronage.

Wednesday 20th February 2008

• TORINO – Rossella Rigattieri
• Rossella talked in Italian about Turin and the changes that have taken place over the centuries to this beautiful, royal city. Turin evolved from a centre of the Roman Empire to the place of residence of kings and the capital of Italy. In the 1960s it became an industrial centre developed around FIAT. It is a centre for the production of chocolates and wine. It hosted the Winter Olympics and boasts many museums, known all over Italy. Rossella took us on a journey through history, culture, legend, magic and reality.

Wednesday 24th October 2007

• Dr Paul Roberts – An evening dedicated to the Italian languages How many languages are spoken in Italy? How spoken Latin degenerated to the point of becoming a beautiful new language? Why only two per cent of Italians were speaking Italian at the time of the creation of the Italian state in 1861? Why words do not exist in Italian to describe a series of common objects? Is the influence of English on the Italian language of today positive or negative? – In Italian.

Wednesday 26th September 2007

• PAVIA
• Illustrated lecture by Dr Trevor Joscelyne
• Dr Trevor Joscelyne, who worked in Milan for the British Council, talked to us about how Shakespeare used Italy in his plays. He concentrated particularly on how Venice and Venetia feature in Shakespeare’s writing. In English.

Wednesday 21st November 2007

• Frank Keenan – Changes in living patterns in provincial Italy particularly in the Marche, from 1970 to 2007 – In Italian

Wednesday 20th June 2007

• SHAKESPEARE AND ITALY: WHAT DID SHAKESPEARE KNOW ABOUT VENICE AND THE VENETO?
• Dr Trevor Joscelyne, who worked in Milan for theBritish Council, talked to us about how Shakespeare used Italy in hisplays. He concentrated particularly on how Venice and Venetia featurein Shakespeare’s writing. In English.

Wednesday 23rd May 2007

• THE SHADOWS OF VENICE
• Rossella Merlino spoke about the historic monuments and places that make Venice a world famous city. Rossella also introduced another side of Venice: the custom of going out with friends to visit the bars and inns of the city to drink wine and enjoy small nibbles of salami and fish – all summed up in the phrase ‘andar per ombre per cicchetti’. Illustrated, in Italian.

Wednesday 25th April 2007

• THE FOUNTAINS OF ROME
• Illustrated lecture in English by James Gilpin of “White Hat Tours”.

Wednesday 21st March 2007

• LOMBARDY AND LAZIO
• Anna Maria Baker and Gabriella McGhee talked to us in Italian about different aspects of their regions, once in the north and the other in the centre.

Wednesday 14th February 2007

• PROTECTING THE FUTURE
• FrFranco La Torre spoke to us in Italian about green issues that affect Italy and the beautiful planet on which we live.

Wednesday 21st June 2006

• MONTEVERDI – SACRED AND SECULAR
• Andrew Rothwell spoke in English of this influential seventeenth century composer, especially about The Vespers and Orfeo.

Wednesday 24th May 2006

• ITALY IN THE SIXTIES
• Frank Keenan spoke in Italian about his experiences in Italy in the 1960s.

Wednesday 22nd March 2006

• BUYING A PROPERTY IN ITALY
• Sheila Stokes spoke in Italian and in English of her experience of property buying in northern Italy.

Wednesday 25th January 2006

• CINECITTĀ AND THE ITALIAN CINEMA
• Oliver Dorotskar explained in Italian the history of Cinecittà and talked about films associated with the famous studios.

Wednesday 25th May 2005

• MATTINATA: A PLEASURE IN EVERY SEASON
• Franco La Torre who comes from Puglia, spoke to us in Italian about his village called Mattinata.

Wednesday 23rd February 2005

• GIUSEPPE VERDI – LIFE AND MUSIC
• Andrew Rothwell gave us a lecture in English on Verdi’s life, with musical examples.

Wednesday 26th January 2005

• COFFEE CULTURE
• Gianni Lauretta, an authority on coffee, told us in Italian of the importance of coffee in today’s society, including Italy. Followed by a degustation!