From the Venetian Exhibition “WILLY RONIS. FOTOGRAFIE 1934-1998.” A unique chance to see a complete retrospective of the French photographer, 120 vintage prints and several unreleased ones. from 6.09.2018 to 06.01.2019
(c) Ministère de la Culture / Médiathèque de l’architecture et du patrimoine / Dist RMN-GP © Donation Willy Ronis
From a vintage set of postcards showing landmark architecture in Firenze, as if each structure was on a waterfront. The postcards date to sometime before the postwar period:
Landmarks named include, above, the church of Orsanmichele
Piazza del Duomo
Above, the Palazzo delle Poste, the modern post office building
The Palazzo Pitti
The Duomo, aka, Santa Maria del Fiore
The Piazza della Signoria
Above the Loggia dell’Orcagna (misspelled on the postcard as loggia dell’Orgagna); aka Loggia dei Lanzi
The Piazzale Michelangelo
The Piazza Vittorio Emanuele, name changed to Piazza della Repubblica sometime after WWII.
This lovely, wistful song is a hymn to a Florence that is no longer. It is sung by Riccardo Marasco and known as Firenze Bottegaia.
A rough translation in English goes like this:
Florence Bottegaia (Riccardo Marasco)
Antique shops,
artisan shops,
shops where you only find things done here.
Silversmiths’ shops
of things today or yesterday
created by the same people who made the city.
Shops where the old ones
they revealed to the boys
secrets inherited from an ancient civilization,
shops of a time that are now no longer ..
I had known her too.
Da Gilli a good coffee ‘between mirrors lights and brass,
the cream in Via Monalda sucked with cialdoni.
The Donnini krapfen,
the famous Dorè.
Emma woman treats, two teas with the ladyfingers
“no thanks tonight I would just like two cream puffs”
in piazza da Revoire there is hot chocolate
but there is no more to cuddle the mandola of Mafaldo.
Florence shop
when I was a child
and already I was proud of being born a Florentine.
Florence shop
what time it is not anymore
you have betrayed those who owe you more.
Capecchiacci disappeared
buttons, strings and laces,
expert in skins and great master in making holes.
He closed Calderai
delicious cold cuts,
caviar mascarpone
the ragù in the volavàn.
Disappeared Bruzzichelli
the palace is also wobbling
for a new shoe you can find yourself in the afterlife.
Where was the Bottegone there is now a bar among many,
I had known you too.
The Corso bookshop sold a little faith,
Balboni in Vigna Nuova churned maddalene.
The old Settepassi is now a Milanese.
The craftsman is evicted,
San Frediano is evicted,
your ills Florence tell me who will evict them?
The most glorious ones are evicted,
history is also evicted.
If it is necessary to evict the old one of su ma ‘.
Florence shop
when you were a child
and you went around proud of being Florentine.
Florence shop
what time it is not anymore
you have betrayed those who owe you more.
Onion fast food,
ties at the old bridge,
where the fontanella pours drugs into the bucket.
Take advantage of the bad
there is a thousand vucumprà
that vendon paccottiglia scattered here and there.
Armani, Valentino
Versace then Trussardi
I’m here to tell us in chorus
“Florentine you were late”.
Florence that was dressing
the spirit and the mind
now he dresses you from the war down.
They are overseas copies of those shops that
they sold originality with genius;
we are the double of the fifth avenue.
Throw everything to the nettle
if one engages in it
it is not necessary then Pegna showed it to us.
Florence shop
for us you were a blazon,
and who knows why you look like a curse.
Florence shop
when I was a child
and already I was proud of being born a Florentine.
Florence shop
on the diamonds of the tu:
if others have betrayed you
I love you even more.
Florence shop
I’m no longer a child
as long as I walk around
I’ll be alone
Florentine.
Upon the beautiful grounds of a once fabulous, historic Florentine villa, the Villa Demidoff, I encountered a feast for all of my senses.
Doré : That day we did not read you there anymore
Paolo Malatesta and Francesca da Polenta are two figures of lovers who became part of the popular sentimental imagination, even though they also belonged to history and literature . A part of the V canto of the Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri is dedicated to them. In the Commedia , the two young people of Rimini (even if born in Ravenna ), of the nearby Verucchio him – represent the main souls condemned to the Dante hell , in the circle of the lustful.
In life they were brothers (Francesca was in fact married to Gianciotto, brother of Paolo) and this love led them to death at the hands of Francesca’s husband. Francesca explains to the poet how it all happened: reading the book that explained the love between Lancelot and Geneva , the two found warmth in the trembling kiss that eventually exchange and that characterizes the beginning of their passion.
The tragic love affair of Paolo and Francesca has been re-enacted on other occasions, always in literature but also in opera . Particularly known, appreciated and loved is the version that gave it in 1914 the Italiancomposer Riccardo Zandonai in his Francesca da Rimini . The commotion “defense” made by Boccaccio (see below) will not go unmentioned, which tells us that at the base of the marriage between Gianciotto and Francesca da Polenta there was a terrible ambiguity encouraged if not designed by the elders of the two families. Francesca, says Boccaccio, was made to believe that she would marry the beautiful and elegant Paolo. Boccaccian observation (defined by Torraca “last novel by Boccaccio”) is tender and sentimental, but does not stand up to a minimum of historical criticism.
get back, lauretta! 
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