If we were to follow the chronological history of the use of the theatre mask during the last century of the second millennium, we would have to begin by referring to a one of theatre’s most representative figures, English director and set designer Edward Gordon Craig (1872-1966), and recount his adventures in the theatre and with the mask. The mask was an element practically unknown at the end of the 1800s. Craig somehow resurrected it by taking it out of the limbo of a far past. Craig, the son of one of the greatest English female actors of all time, Ellen Terry, was among the most important innovators of twentieth century theatre and the only one who originated directly from the stage itself. A critic of the hyper-realistic acting style that was trending at the time, Craig proposed the idea of a super-marionette with its face covered by a mask, reminiscent of ancient Greek theatre. This super-marionette would work within the realm of a set reduced to only its essential elements yet, at the same time, enriched with the movement of architectonic structures. In 1908, the magazine “Masks” was first published in Florence and in it Craig wrote, “There was a time when the mask was used in war, when war was considered an art. There was a time when the mask was used in ceremonies because the human face wasn’t considered to be powerful enough. Then came the moment when the mask was used by the greats of classical theatre: Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. Then came the time when the proud actor didn’t want his face covered and discarded the mask. There was a time when masks were used for child’s play and masquerade parties. Today we have to create a new mask, without resorting the history of the past, which will reflect the soul of the actor and make theatre even greater”. We would ultimately find Craig in the role of professor at the Accademia delle Belle Arti (The Academy of Fine Arts) in Florence, teaching young students a theatre of pure movement. Craig would undoubtedly have a certain influence on the young Amleto Sartori, who was studying sculpting at the same institute. The first stone had now been tossed and curiosity for this extraordinary instrument and object, the mask, would awaken. The mask would permeate the theatre for the entire twentieth century.
A few years later, in 1912 Germany, the then twenty four year old Oskar Schlemmer, one of the fathers of the Weimer Bauhaus, would formulate his first ideas related to works on dance, costumes, and masks. His concepts would be defined as Triadic Ballet and later achieve notoriety in the theatre. In France, almost at the same time, a young dramaturg by the name of Jacques Copeau[1], also a prominent actor, director, and author, would inaugurate a small space on the Left Bank known as the Theatre of the Vieux Colombier. From 1913 to 1924, the Theatre of the Vieux Colombier would resonate throughout Europe, by not only being a breeding ground for theatre artists, but also for its implementation of a new type of scenic apparatus and its decision to use the mask as a theatrical device. From that point on, the mask would take on a role of primary importance in the research and formation of an actor who lives theatre as a fundamental dimension of his or her own existence.
Copeau was a true master of the first half of the twentieth century. He was considered by many as the originator of a new way of creating theatre with his conceptual creation of instilling in the actor a certain determination to delve into an atmosphere of exultation with respect to the text and theatrical event. This line of approach would later be adopted as a road map by some of the most innovative theatre artists of the French stage, from Chales Dullin to Louis Jouvet (who Copeau had already met in 1910), from Goerges Pitoëff to the younger Jean Vilar.
The cultural fervor of those years was also stimulated by a strong initiative on the part of theatre researchers and historians to trace the past of their lost roots relating to the study of a theatre form with popular beginnings. This genre existed from the beginning of the Renaissance on, for over two centuries, and it was the indisputable predominant theatre form found on the stages of the entire western world: Commedia dell’Arte. The starting point was initiated by a young theatre critic and historian, the Russian Kostantin Miklaševskij (1886-1944), who in 1914 published a work in Saint Petersburg entitled, La Commedia dell’arte o il Teatro dei commedianti italiani dei secoli XVI,XVII,XVIII (Commedia dell’Arte or The Theatre of the Italian Comic Actor of the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries). The work, which appeared in the Russian magazine “L”amore delle melarance”[2] (The Love of the Three Oranges), managed by Mejerchol’d, had an irrefutable historical and documentary importance. The magazine also possessed a relevant prominence in that it provided tangible evidence of an era of revival and renewed attention to Commedia dell’Arte techniques, themes and stock characters in the Russian Theatre of the Avant-Guarde[3].
Copeau had a long love affair with the stock characters of the Improvised Commedia. From the beginning of his theatrical adventures, he studied and shared this interest with Leon Chancerel, a renowned theatre professional who brought to Copeau’s attention a vast documented assortment of work regarding the characters found in art. Among these works was one written by Maurice Sand, Masques et Buffons, published in Paris in 1860 and illustrated with the highly prized polychrome etchings of A. Manceau. It was precisely within this context that Mic[4] wanted to meet Copeau during one of his visits to Paris. The encounter sparked a strong friendship and a long collaboration together. In Copeau’s opinion, in fact, “The masked actor has a greater effect than one with his face visible to the audience”.
After a long period of accepting various jobs in the theatre, French actor and director Charles Dullin (1885-1949) decided to join Copeau on his journey with the Vieux Colombier up until 1921. It was at this point that Dullin founded his own school that would be attended by Antonin Artaud, Jean-Louis Barrault, and Etienne Decroux, among others.
At the start of World War I, two young men were on a train heading to Paris to join the 22nd Dragoon Regiment. These two men were Pierre Louis Duchartre and Charles Dullin[5].
It was this encounter that convinced Duchartre to dive into the strange world of theatre, which wasn’t a world that belonged to him by choice, but because it viscerally fascinated him. At the end of the war, sure enough, he dedicated himself to the study of the origins of theatre and the stock characters of Commedia dell’Arte. As a result of his research, he published a first draft of La Comédie Italienne in 1925, which would become one of the most sought-after cultural references for actors, directors, scholars and theatre professionals.[6]
Among the many students at the school founded and directed by Copeau and located adjacent to the Theatre of the Vieux Colombier, one in particular, Etienne Decroux, emerged at the theatre due to his use of the body as a theatrical element. He became one the promoters of a mime genre from which many up and coming actors of the time would draw. Jean-Louis Barrault and Marcel Marceau were among these actors. The concept of “Enlever le visage pour ritrouver le corp” (covering the face to find the body) would stand out as the teaching methodology of the school and become the motto of Decroux, who thought it sufficient enough to hide the actor’s facial expressions from the audience. To achieve this objective, he fine-tuned his own original technique of using the mask and created them by utilizing a light fabric, we could say a veil, that enveloped the actor’s entire head, yet allowed him to see relatively clearly and breathe perfectly.
At the school, however, the pasteboard masks used were constructed according to an experimental technique created by Copeau. The technique consisted of layering pieces of torn newspaper over each other and then securing them together with a starchy glue created by cooking flour together with a small lump of sugar. The significance of adding sugar to the composition of the glue was a secret that Copeau kept to himself. This secret ingredient became one of the mysteries that enveloped the masks for a long time and added a certain fascination to them.
The masks, which had a vague anthropomorphic look to them, had to be devoid of any type of expression. This would offer the acting student a way to articulate emotions and feelings with sole use of body gestures.[7] This particular teaching instrument was the noble or calm mask, named for the proud lack of expressiveness that characterized it. Many years later, following Second World War, it would take on the name of the neutral mask[8].
Jean Dastè, Copeau’s student, not to mention, son in law as well, having married his daughter Marie Hèléne, disseminated Copeau’s technique. After his experience at the Theatre of the Vieux Colombier, Dastè decided to follow his teacher who, after a series of unexpected difficulties of varying nature, withdrew to the region of Borgogna where he founded an acting group named the Copiaus.
In 1945, Dastè and Marie Hèléne founded their own company, Les Comédiens de Grenoble. In Grenoble they put into practice Copeau’s theories, studies, and his use of the mask. It was also here where the young Jean Lecoq made his first appearance as a professional mime actor, after having just completed a course of study in the dramatic arts taught by Charles Dullin and Jean-Louis Barrault.
Working with the theatre group in Grenoble was of great significance for the twenty four year old mime in that it offered Lecoq the opportunity to meet the legendary Copeau, learn the pedagogical traditions of the Theatre of the Vieux Colombier, and above all, benefit from the experience of his collaboration with the Copiaus theatre group.In fact, it was through Dastè that Lecoq discovered the Jeu du Masque and, more importantly, learned many clever technical aspects of both the use and the creation of papier-mâché masks.
Following his return to Paris in 1945, Lecoq was hired by the newly founded school, E.P.J.D (Éducation par le jeu dramatique), headed by J.L. Barrault. At the school, he discovered his talent for teaching (rather than pursuing an acting career), and it was here that he would later meet director Gianfranco De Bosio, who was from the Veneto region of Italy. Both De Bosio and his colleague, Lieta Papafava dei Carraresi, had the opportunity to come to Paris for a refresher theatre course at E.P.J.D. thanks to an academic scholarship granted by the University of Padua. De Bosio, assistant to poet Diego Valeri, was the then director of the School for the Arts and did everything possible to change the future of the University’s theatre, which was, at the time, extremely conservative and permeated by traditional genres that didn’t reflect the cultural euphoria sweeping across Europe in the immediate postwar era.
In fact, amidst that enthusiastic climate, the University produced a series of cultural initiatives under the direction of distinguished personalities from the world of theatre as well as young people who had taken part in the Resistance under the guidance of Egidio Meneghetti. One opportunity that emerged from these cultural initiatives was the founding of a university theatre with new ideas and vigor.
Sure enough, upon returning from Paris, De Bosio took the University Theatre guide and founded a theatre school that was annexed to the university and became part its educational program. Those invited to teach at the school were, among others, Lecoq (movement), Lieta Papfava (acting and text analysis), Ludovico Zorzi (theatre history), and Amleto Sartori (art history and mask molding).
A few days following his arrival, Lecoq held his first demonstration for the students of the theatre company. He immediately showed what he knew how to do; he demonstrated, in particular, the famous marche sur place, the characteristic walking in place performed by mimes and invented by Decroux in the 1930s. One student made an ironic observation by shouting out, “That’s great…but where are you headed?”. The comment brought Lecog to the realization that pure mime, considered as an autonomous genre and performed by actors such as Decroux and Marcel Marceau (who made extraordinary careers out of it), was very different from the Mime dramatique which was open to theatre and had pedagogical goals, something that Lecog had already sensed for some time.
Lecoq didn’t have any masks at all with him when he arrived in Padua. He had stupidly (bêtement) lent the only mask he possessed, a gift from his friend Dastè, to a dancer for a presentation in Germany: “I arrived in Paris with the technique for the construction of the neutral mask in my head and the intention to work with it at the school”.
De Bosio, therefore, recommended he talk to Sartori[9], who had already created masks for a show of black poetry produced by University of Padua and performed in the 16th century rooms of Palace Papafava, located on via Marsala.
Other masks would follow and be featured in various and diverse productions staged at the University Theatre between the years 1948 to 1951. These shows included Le cento notti, a show based on characters from Japanese Noh theatre and brought to Padua by Lecoq as an example of his experience in Grenoble; Porto di mare, a pantomime utilizing Sartori’s neutral mask and choreographed by Lecoq; and I pettogolezzi delle donne by Carlo Goldoni, directed by Lecoq with set design by Misha Scandella. Among other productions, an extraordinary staging of Six Characters in Search of an Author emerged, directed by Lecoq with Giulio Bosetti playing the role of the son. The work, so full of Pirandellian ideas and theories, gave Sartori the opportunity to research the depths of the human psyche and produce a series of masks, reflecting the characters themselves and created in polychromatic paper-mâchè, an element which would lend a decisive modern tone to the entire play. It was during this period that many works were inspired by the writings of Angelo Beolco, followed by studies on Ruzzante undertaken by French scholar Alfred Mortier and Emilio Lovarini. These studies were published during the first half of the century (and even later), thanks to the contributions of two Paduan scholars and historians, Ludovico Zorzi and Paolo Sambin.
The die was now cast, and the fame of Sartori’s masks[10] spread so rapidly that they gained approval not only in Italy but also, and above all, in a resurgent postwar Europe. Surely enough, as soon as the reputation of the leather masks created by the Italian artist came to the attention of Jean Louis Barrault in Paris, he wanted to experiment with them. First, he used Sartori’s Commedia masks for a production at The Marigny Theatre in Paris in 1951. He then later worked with masks based on characters found in Ruzzante’s work, La Vaccaria.[11] The productions had great success in Paris and the new masks so captivated both the director and the audience that they were honored with a new production. Barrault wanted to stage Aeschylus’ complex trilogy, The Oresteia, using 75 leather masks created by Sartori, at The Bordeaux International Arts Festival in 1951 followed by a production of the same work at The Odeon Theatre in Paris.[12]
Those years, linked to theatre and masks, produced my first childhood memories, and they passed before my eyes as if everything were a game. I recall the long sleepless nights surrounded by actors and theatre professionals who came to the house on Riviera Paleocapa with its windows through which I could spot the majestic grandeur of the The Specola Observatory.
I remember the frenetic conversations of the one and only Agostino Contarello, a Paduan actor and author who would come by to rehearse his characters before playing them on stage at the University Theatre. It was during those endless nights of forced wakefulness that dozens of people met to discuss theatre or simply to drink a good glass of wine together. I, in fact, slept in the small living room next to the kitchen, the only heated room, where all the meetings took place. They would often become all-night events. The friendship my father had with Jacques (and later with Marcello Moretti as well, who played an extraordinary Harlequin under the direction of Gorgio Strehler) was such that they would disappear for days in search of characters and distinctive faces, true human masks which could only be found in certain emblematic parts of city or in the surrounding areas.
The colorful and aromatic open-air markets in Piazza delle Frutti and in Piazza delle Erbe, located in the Sotto il Salone[13] shopping area of the old city, was swarming with a picturesque fauna of the working-class and was therefore an inexhaustible source of inspiration for the Paduan masks based on Ruzante’s concepts. Amleto loved these places and went there often for inspiration along with Jacques who, curious and ecstatic as a child, was discovering the true essence of working-class Italy. The Italy of both Improvised Commedia and the plays of Beolco was there, alive with real characters and the typical shrieking sounds of every neighborhood’s open-air market.
Like all fairy tales, even the adventures of the University of Padua’s theatre had to end. In fact, the first signs of the crisis gripping the school’s University Theatre resulted in the arrival of Gorgio Strehler, who, along with Paolo Grassi, had already successfully launched the Piccolo Teatro di Milano.
Sartori first met Strehler on a sunny day in late 1951. They met in the shadows of the stones in a café overlooking the Olympic Theatre in Vicenza, where the The Piccolo Teatro was staging Sophocles’ Electra directed by Strehler and choreographed by Lecoq.
Amleto’s association with the Piccolo Teatro would continue until the artist’s death and would result in the creation of the first masks made in leather, among others, for a production of The Servant of Two Masters, featuring the great Marcello Moretti. Subsequently, I would continue the collaboration with Strehler in my creation of other masks, including one of the Harlequin Cat for Ferruccio Soleri, an actor who still dominates stages worldwide.
From that point on, Amleto’s future efforts would focus on the study of the theatre mask. Unfortunately, he didn’t have the good fortune of reaping the benefits of so much work. Amleto passed away at the early age of 46, following a strenuous yet useless battle with cancer.
It was now my turn to continue the still strong tradition, thereby assuring the continuation of his extraordinary research that would self-perpetuate through me, a student-son who, from a young age, grew up among the daily activities of an art studio that had a vague scent of the Renaissance. These were difficult times, during which I struggled with decisions on how to proceed with the work and which path to follow that wouldn’t be an unimaginative continuation of that which had already been discovered. Shortly following, however, while I was spending time in Paris, the cultural avalanche of 1968 occurred, which I found overwhelming. The emotions produced by this remarkable and epic event was so enlightening that it led me to make decisions and choices that I still do not regret to this day.
Combining theatre with visual arts, music with gestures and dance, and color with form transported me into a new multidisciplinary dimension that allowed the exploration of adventures and experiments, which would lead to every corner of the world.
An opportunity to put my experience into practice emerged when I was invited to participate at the Venice Biennale in an experimental theatre pilot project that was trending at the time. The project was entitled, Decentramento nel territorio (decentralization in the land), and I was assigned to Mirano[14], one of the small towns in the Venetian hinterland. The theatre trial took place in an antique villa in Veneto, the aristocratic house of Venetian doges. The seminar would simply address the theatre mask with the goal of instilling in the students creativity, art and theatre by means of various types of stimulation. The event, however, produced far more than just the creation of masks. The participants were chosen from among students attending schools in the surrounding area and from factory workers within the notorious industrial sector of Marghera, where thousands of laborers were directed to work with poisonous materials and inhale toxic fumes. The political tensions of the time produced discontent and bitterness among the working class, who felt misused and oppressed by the multinational oil companies. There was a tangible reaction from the people: a daily barricading of the streets, burning of tires, and vociferous protests. Reaction and anger were the elements I took into consideration, and they would become the creative themes undertaken. The masks that emerged from the workshops were dramatic and were not reflective of a theatre of the romantic past, but rather of a suggestive theatre of the current living era.
They were gas or death masks; body shielding coverings or screens; chest pieces with tubes that would allow the inhalation of life sustaining oxygen; and contorted chest plates reflecting sufferance and pain. The objects produced demonstrated a dramatic condemnation of social exploitation, raised awareness of those exposed to cancer and pulmonary edema as well as many other similar work related illnesses. These dramatic sculptures, with their symbolic and disturbing presence, attracted and engrossed the large crowds that flocked to the square to watch the workshop’s final performance-presentation. An acrylic web, mounted in advance, covered everything, including the space above the square. At the conclusion of the performance, the crowd’s reaction was unbridled, so much so, that it assumed the aspects of a cathartic and collective dance in an apotheosis of liberating and propitiatory gestures in an attempt to grab the delicate web that was fluttering in wind. Then began a type of collective game that produced joyous shouts and wholehearted laughter. Much later, at its conclusion, only a few scraps of the material lay on the ground. In the end, the voracious audience decided to take on the role of actor in its own interpretation of the work itself, thereby using up the remaining material. The anatomical figures in question had been, in this case, the medium that catalyzed the audience participation.
The mask dies were produced by means of casting various anatomical parts of preselected volunteers posed in a certain manner, thereby crystallizing a pre-arranged body gesture or position. Layers of papier-mâché, or celastic (a particular plastic material similar to papier-mâché) were then placed over the plaster reverse image. By following this procedure, a specific technique was fine-tuned to create the obverse of the mask in leather. This was the birth of the first usable full body sculptured form (a kind of symbolic and anthropomorphic figure) of the “newly created super-marionette” which could be used gesturally or presented as an emblematic presence in action and utilized in urban performance. It was baptized as a gestural structure (as Jacques Lecoq recalls), and for the first time it instilled in me the drive to create a type of total mask.
Thus, 1979 saw the formation of the first main site for the mask known as the Centro Maschere e Strutture Gestuali (the Centre for Gestural Masks and Structures). The Centre was comprised of me, in addition to Paola Trombetta, a young scenic designer at the time with previous theatre experience, and the neo-architect, Paola Pizzi. Sarah, the third generation of our artistic family, has also taken part in Centre for many years now.
The multidisciplinary organism (which still today gravitates around the significance of the mask) was later divided into three branches or areas of research and study:
- the ethnic-anthropological mask
- the theatre mask, from ancient times to the present
- beyond the mask
This last area of study emphasized the latest multidisciplinary studies related to urban performances (in which city locations acted as both scenic settings and actual characters in themselves) and gestural structures. The start of this long journey began with difficulties and many uncertainties. The journey, full of highs and lows and extraordinary cultural adventures, would still keep us united after thirty years of comradery. Throughout the course of an entire year, we would travel continuously to every part of Europe with the presentation of didactic activities and workshops, the organization of consistently more significant and complex exhibits, the creation of masks for new theatre works and the planning of urban performances and outdoor happenings.
The seminars would often include diverse collaborations with actors, performers, and visual artists. Among the many artists who took part, Mario Gonzales would stand out as a true talent in his interpretation of the characters found in Commedia dell’Arte. Gonzales, having returned from an extraordinary experience in the Téâtre du Soleil’s production of L’Age d’Or (The Golden Age), directed by Arianne Mnouchkine, would collaborate in a series of seminars in Brussels, Belgium, and one in Como, organized by the Piccolo Teatro di Milano. Later he would collaborate in Greece, or rather, on the island of Zakintos, where we had the good fortune of having the participation of the Minister of Culture, actress Melina Mercouri, who would perform in a series of shows featuring female masks. Following a grueling tour in Eastern Europe, where we hit the most important capitals such as Bucharest, Warsaw, Prague, Budapest and Belgrade, the echo of our work reached Italy and found its way into the bureaucratic maze of the 1980 Venice Biennale. The director at the time, Maurizio Scaparro, whose innovative and fanciful ambitions transformed the city into an enormous stage, sent for me. He wanted me to present a project consistent with the new aura, which was taking form as the necessary component that would define the consummate originality of the event. He wanted to revive the ancient Venetian carnival, which had been gone for centuries, and reframe it not only as a playful event, but as a theatrical and cultural experience as well. There could be no better occasion to present my new mask for a newly created carnival that, from that point on, would be the beginning of a new era in the City of Venice.
I proposed a project that would respect Scaparro’s aspirations yet go beyond the theatrical parameters within which he wanted to restrict me. My collaborators and I proceeded without limitations and took the small theatre on the north side of the old Palazzo Grassi, the main venue for some of Venice’s largest exhibits. By removing the old armchairs, we created a remarkable workshop and performance space. Together with the new staff of the Centro di Abano Terme, we held a series of meetings at The Academy of Fine Arts with the goal of selecting collaborators among its students and teachers. We sent for the Polish avant-garde musical ensemble, The Osmego Dnia Orkiestra, a group that came to my attention during our tour in Eastern Europe. We also worked with Teatro Modo, a community theatre company from the Venetian outskirts, and with the modern dance group, Charà. We then began our work with the support of at least sixty collaborators. The project took the name of Ambienteazione (action-environment), a term that wouldn’t create any doubt about the project’s identity. We worked day and night creating architectonic reliefs of areas of the city, then by doing historical research to create cadastral maps in order to identify the easiest routes for a travelling audience.
The stage and performance spaces were used daily for theatre and dance rehearsals or to experiment with the best methods needed to install the acrylic fiber in the most emblematic parts of Venice. As the performance date approached, the anxiety increased proportionally, caused by a lack of the available time necessary to complete the show preparations. During the final forty days, in an attempt to not waste time, the theatre space became an enormous campsite where we would eat little and repose in sleeping bags. The days leading up to Fat Tuesday were utilized by the group to wrap the small streets, squares, bell towers, bridges and historic buildings with the white fiber, which took on the aspects of an enormous spider web. Along the route, the invasive acrylic material created spaces suitable for theatre action and performance. These spaces were the venues into which the human element would be inserted into framework of the esthetic piece, thereby giving life to art through gestures and dance. The morning of that momentous Tuesday was a grey and humid day. To the first hurried passersby, Piazza San Marco (Saint Mark’s Square) appeared completely transformed, masked by an enormous weave of white strands that stretched from the balcony of the bell tower all the way to the old and new prosecutor’s offices. This aerial dome, a fluttering oval mass that swelled in the sea breeze and deflated as the wind subsided in a kind of ethereal dance, masked the sky.
The square filled quickly with curious crowds and tourists who would become the event’s audience members for an entire day of theatrical and artistic entertainment as well as dance created for the occasion. A miracle took place, however, at night when an overwhelming crowd crammed the streets prior to the occurrence of an unbridled event that neither my collaborators nor I could have foreseen.
Under the spotlights set up by RAI-TV (Radiotelevisone Italiana, Italy’s public television network), and amidst the poignant sounds produced by the Polish group’s complex musical instruments, something happened that I would never have expected. The unpredictable fascination of the moment and the sonorous effects, which followed the rhythm of the wind thrust upon the enormous aerial blanket, spread throughout the entire square and triggered an explosion of participative energy (dormant until that moment) in the crowd. This was how the immense group of 85,000 people began their participation. They took hold of the strands fluttering in the wind and used them in a collective game encompassing tens of thousands of hands that stirred in the air in an attempt to grab, pull, and disentangle the web that now covered the entire crowd present in the square. This was the celebration of the first Venetian carnival devoid of masks, but covered with a unique single masking of the area that would begin an infinite succession of newly created revivals of the city’s carnival[15].
The performance was the beginning of the modern carnival in Venice, and Centro Maschere, in collaboration with Ambienteazione, saw the fortunate start of a series of seminars, shows and urban performances that, within a few years, would bring us to some most the prominent Italian cities such as Genoa, Trieste, Naples, Padua, Milan, and later, to Bologna and Florence. These events, which were far from traditional theatre, always mirrored each other on every stop of the tour though, at the same time, required specific designs for each performance site in order to meet the different social, cultural, and architectonic expectations of each location.
It was for this reason that the show and urban performance designed by Maschio Angioini for a production in Naples was completely different from the show created for the City of Padua and the event in Milan, where we made use of the interiors and exteriors of the Castello Sforzesco. These shows were also different from the extremely complex and difficult performance staged in Piazza della Signoria in Florence, where it was necessary to utilize large aerostatic balloons filled with helium, which were necessary elements for the construction of a dome (antithetical to Brunelleschi’s nearby cupola) made of ephemeral material.
The 1980s and 1990s saw a growing number of our activities in Europe such as touring exhibitions, pedagogical workshops, installations and urban performances that were also in demand in Latin America, The United States, and in the Middle and Far East. They were intense years for the planning and mounting of new themed exhibits. Through the promotion of cultural exchange between Italy and foreign nations by The Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, we toured in Nigeria, Tanzania, Ghana, The Ivory Coast, and in capital cities such as Paris, Moscow, Tokyo, and Beijing (where we witnessed the student uprisings in Tien-An- Men Square). Later we travelled to Houston in The United States, Rio de Janeiro, where we mounted a spectacular urban performance in downtown Piazza di Cinelandia, Sao Paulo, Brasilia, and other cities in northeastern Brazil.
Each project, produced in various parts of the world, would give us the opportunity to radically insert ourselves into the cultural fabric of each different nation. This gave us the opportunity to collect materials, documents, and objects used for the realization of a concept that would take form (with pressing urgency) as La casa delle maschere (the house of masks).
Throughout the years that followed, our time would be split between our home workshop in Abano Terme, a pleasant hot springs town located midway between Padua and Venice, and long stays abroad, which were a kind of a forced exile where, however, we would always and forever be primarily known for the long history of our professional work. Among the projects, an opportunity would materialize around the mid-nineteen nineties in the form of a request by the prestigious Swedish theatre company, The Folkteatern of headed by Peter Oskarson, to revive from the depths of a distant past the medieval Nordic masks, which were the legacy of the great Viking epics.
The ambitious World Theatre Project[16], part of a much larger European program, made use of a Swedish theatrical entity that would provide, among other logistical structures, the very
well equipped studio-workshop, Maskverkstaden, which I managed for close to ten years. I, along with collaborators from the Nordic staff, would use the venue as a home base for historical research, experimentation and the creation of sculptures, masks, tools and objects utilized within the complex framework of international theatre.
It was within this realm that a remarkable production of Aeschylus’ complex trilogy The Oresteia, directed by Peter Oskarson, was staged. The project gave us the opportunity take various trips to predetermined sites for historical research related to the staging of the Greek work. We traveled to India, Mozambique and to many small Greek towns to familiarize ourselves with the environments, theatres and religious locations cited in the play. In order to fine-tune the 140 masks, created based on new classifications and production techniques, we experimented with the acoustics envisaged in Greek choruses. In doing so, it gave us the opportunity to compare these masks with those created by my father fifty years prior for a production of the same tragedy, directed by J.L. Barrault, at the Odeon Theatre in Paris.
The new millennium appeared to have brought about a renewed interest in an autochthonous cultural energy in Italy, putting aside the natural inclination toward foreign interests that, for some time, focused on pro-American globalization. It was during this renewed cultural interest that Abano Terme decided unanimously, in an historic town meeting, to designate an old villa, properly restored and equipped, as the main museum dedicated to the family’s research and activities.
It became the new house of masks, a living museum, constantly in flux, where there would be a convergence of interests, not only predisposed to scholars in the field, but also to those interested in theatre, music, and the expressive arts. In short, it was open to everyone who desired to acquaint themselves with their own cultural roots, which gave Italian culture an historic role and placed the museum among the top of some of most extraordinary artistic sites on the planet.
These past few years have been dedicated, above all, to the ambitious planning of this museum. The crowning achievement would be a multi-year collective work by those associated with the Centre, whether they were historical collaborators who for some time accompanied us with a remarkable spirit of abnegation or those temporary contributors who, now and again, worked side by side with us in the creation of numerous projects. These projects would follow one after another through the natural evolution of the Centre’s work.
Thanks to the invaluable work of my wife, Paola, above all, who has accompanied me on this exceptionaly adventure for over thirty years, we are fine-tuning a precise plan. Through the implementation of cultural activities and international exchange programs that now define the identity of the Centro Maschere e Strutture Gestuali, we would engage the entire region (known as the host site), including the Venetian hinterland and, in particular, the enormous hot springs basin located at the base of the Euganean Hills.
We have been working on the project for years, and it now finally seems to be arduously reaching its completion, thus allowing us to centralize all the resources and merits accumulated over three-quarters of a century in Venetian territory, the natural historic center of the theatrical, recreational and carnival mask.
The Casa delle maschere, hence, is not just a mask museum, or a mask rest home, as we would have starved to death had that been the case, but also as a vibrant place, open to the most multidisciplinary and eclectic projects of Commedia dell’Arte, music, dance, movement, and artistic work defined in its broadest terms[17]. It is here, following decades of grueling artistic and cultural work, research done around the world, and extensive dissemination of the meaning of the Italian theatre mask, that we opened the Amleto and Donato Sartori International Mask Museum. The museum would call everyone’s attention to a communicative instrument considered throughout the ages as one of the most widespread theatrical objects worldwide from the beginning of human existence. The museum was inaugurated in 2005 by Franca Rame and Nobel laureate Dario Fo with a show staged expressly for the occasion entitled, Maschere, Pupazzi e Uomini Dipinti.
[1] Jacques Copeau (Paris 1879 – Beaume 1949) was an actor, director, and author who founded The Theatre of the Vieux Colombier in Paris in 1913. The theatre had a school annexed to it, attended by some of the future’s most notable theatre professionals of the century. These renowned professionals were not only French artists, but those of other nationalities as well.
[2] The magazine had the subheading of The Magazine of Dottor Dappettutto, and it was managed under this pseudonym by Mejerchol’d. The magazine, consisting of nine volumes in total, opposed the psychological and naturalistic theatre trending at the time and promoted the techniques of Commedia dell’Arte and the work of Gozzi, The publication mirrored the activities taking place at the workshop on Borodinskaja Street.The magazine published a number of articles on Italian comedic actors along with scenarios and works by Gozzi. See C. Solivetti, L’amore delle tre melerance, la rivista del Dottor Dappertutto, Carte segrete, 1976, Nr. 32, pp. 15-30.
[3] There are no in-depth studies on the history of the Commedia dell’Arte performed in Russia. We only know of the appearance of one of the first theatre companies of Commedia actors at the Court of Tsarina Anna Ivanova in 1731. From this date forward, many companies have had the good fortune to travel into Soviet territory and disseminate Commedia dell’Arte in all of Russia. They ventured even as far as Siberia where they, presumably, made contact with China’s Peking Opera which, to this day, still has dramaturgical components, masks, and classifications that lead back to Italian Improvised Commedia.
[4] After emigrating to Paris, Constantin Miklaševskij assumed the nickname of MIC, and it was this pseudonym that appeared on the French translation of his book in 1927.
[5] See the interview of P.L. Duchartre in Arte della Maschera nella Commedia dell’Arte, edited by D. Sartori, B. Lanata, Firenze, Casa Usher 1983.
[6] In a bibliographic note in the 1927 French edition of his book, Miklaševskij emphasized the translation accuracy of the extraordinary bibliography he compiled in 1914 by writing: Mr. Duchartre was kind enough to accurately reproduce it so well in the second edition of his Comédie italienne that I can dispense with drafting it again here. It is worth noting that Duchartre’s edition, republished in 1955 with the title of La commedia dell’Arte et ses enfants, is often cited precisely for the rich bibliography that it contains.
[7] In Copeau’s theatre, masks were only used for didactatic purposes, that is, in the development of the actor. Masks were never used in the company’s public performances.
[8] Upon his arrival in Padua, Lecoq brought along the idea of the noble mask. The only mask he had of this type was made of papier-mâché and based on his experience with Copeau. Lecog lent this mask to a dancer and never saw it again. The maschera neutra, or neutral mask, now known worldwide, derived its name in Padua from sculptor Amleto Sartori, who would create the first of these masks in leather by copying the facial characteristics of a bronze portrait of Lecoq, which Sartori was working on at that time. The neutral mask had been under study for a long time, six years in total, first by Amleto, then by Donato. The male and female masks, utilized in schools of theatre pedagogy (such as Lecoq’s school in Paris, for example), were created by Donato. The expressive masks, always used as an educational tool, were made of papier-mâché by Amleto, while those of Donato were sculpted in wood then created in leather.
[9] Amleto, inherently skilled as a portrait artist, was intrigued by Lecoq’s request to create noble and calm masks that would be subsequently used at the theatre school. Not only did Amleto provide space in his workshop at the Pietro Selvatico Art School, where he taught, but also strongly proposed his own skilled assistance after determining the student’s extreme inability to shape the neutral expressions of the mask. Lecoq recounts “…the most difficult thing for the students was molding the clay for the neutral masks. The neutral masks were only neutral in name. The overhanging bumps and sharp edges made it difficult to separate the masks from the molds, and once the masks were placed on our faces, they impeded the emotions expressed. Sartori watched our efforts with respect and a bit of compassion. When the time came to present my first masked pantomime, “Porto di mare”, inspired by the port in Chioggia, Amelto decided with a sense of authority and competence that he would create the masks because ours were too ugly. No one dared object to his decision, and I didn’t expect anyone to do so, considering that a great weight was being lifted from our shoulders. Thus, with these neutral masks made of glued papier-mâché, Amleto began his adventure with the mask, and for me, it was beginning of long collaboration and friendship together…”
Quoted in “La geometria al servizio dell’emozione” by J. Lecoq in Arte della maschera nella Commedia dell’Arte.
[10] Amleto Sartori always had an innate rapport with the mask. From an early age, in fact, his deep predisposition to grotesque figures could be seen in his carvings. In 1928, at the age of thirteen, he began sculpting work for antique dealer Alfredo Bordin, a project that would take around ten years. During that time, he would create tens upon tens of grotesque sculptures, masks, and monsters in Arolla pine, in low-relief and in the round, all of which would furnish Bordin’s entire apartment. These works are now on exhibit at the Museo Civico del Santo in Padua.
[11] In 1960-1961, the Ensemble Theatre in Essen, Germany produced Des Ruzante Rede, so er vom Schlachtfeld kommen (Parlamento de Ruzante che jera vegnù dal campo), staged by first time director and Brecht student, Peter Palitzsch, translated by Heinz Riedt (winner of Wieland Translation Prize in 1981 for his work on La Moscheta), and sets and costumes designed by Amleto Satori.
[12] Note by Ludovico Zorzi, found among the set of annotations in Ruzante’s Vaccaria, Rinaldi edition, Padua, 1954, p. 315: “While correcting drafts (April 1954), I receive news that Jean Louis Barrault, one of the most brilliant and learned professionals in theatre who praised France and Europe, is preparing a production of La Vaccaria, based on the translation by Mortier. The play will most likely be presented at Paris’ Marigny Theatre during its 1954-1955 season, after over four decades from the show’s debut. The eight drawings found among the illustrations in this volume are part of a series of preliminary sketches of leather masks created by friend, Amleto Sartori, in collaboration with Barrault himself, for the imminent staging of the show. Therefore, it seems that Ruzante’s modern esthetic destiny of being rediscovered, interpreted and reintroduced to clamoring audiences remains the privilege of the unbiased intelligence and sensibilities of French artists and scholars such as Sand, Mortier, Copeau and Barrault.
–Ludovico Zorzi’s note in Ruzante’s, Vaccaria, Padova, Rinaldo, 1954, p. 315.
[13] Il Palazzo della Ragione (The Palace of Reason), better known by people of Padua as Salone, was built in the city’s historic center in 1218, and it was the main site of the old courtrooms found within the territory. Until recently, it held the European architectural record for having the largest hall ever built without the support of columns. Giotto painted the fresco found on the immense walls, but these works of art were later lost due to a great fire.
[14] Within the framework of same project, promoted by The Venice Biennale of 1977, additional small towns in the Venetian hinterland were assigned to other notable cultural figures such as Giuliano Scabia, who worked in Mira with his poetic carousel and Dario Fo, who working at theatres in Venice and Mestre, would frequently join us in Mirano to collaborate with our group.
[15] The old eighteenth-century style Venetian carnival lasted until the fall of Republic. Austrian rule took control and decreed its end in 1797. Things weren’t any better under Napoleonic rule. The new Venetian carnival only began with the 1980 Theatre Biennale entrusted to management of director Maurizio Scaparro. That year Scaparro unified all the events created as a result of the Biennale together with the newly restored carnival.
[16] The World Theatre Project included the collaboration of international groups such as The Peking Opera of Shanghai, China, directed by Ma-Ke; The Natana Kairali center for Kutiyattam and Kathakali dance of Kerala, India, directed by Gopal Venu; the Avenida Theatre, a company in Mozambique dedicated to African war dance; Folkteatern of Gäyle, Sweden, directed by Peter Oskarson; and The Centre for Masks and Gestural Structures of Abano Terme.
It was in the workshop of his father Amleto, notable Paduan sculptor (1915-1962), where Donato developed his first notions of art and culture. Following the death of his father, Donato’s artistic endeavors were divided between his career as a sculptor and research on the theatre mask. In 1968 Paris, he made contact with Pierre Restany, creator of the Noveau Realisme movement, met Cesar, Tinguely, and Christo and began a new style of research, thereby freeing himself from methods used by his father. At the same time, he collaborated with some of the most representative theatre groups and avant-guarde directors such as the Bread and Puppet Theatre, Kantor, Peter Brook, Eugenio Barba’s Odin Theatret, the school of Jacques Lecoq, and Dario Fo. In the Far East, he gained the of approval of great theatre families such as those found in Bali, The Noh Theatre (Hideo Kanze) and the Kyogen Theatre (the Nomura family) in Japan, and The Peking Opera in China (Ma-Ke). In 1979 he, along with Paola Piizzi and Paola Trombetta, founded The Centre for Masks and Gestural Structures, and together they organized seminars, workshops, performances, and exhibitions around the world. These activities took place at The Venice Biennale, in Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Paris, London, Tokyo, and Moscow, among other places. From 2002, he has taught The History of the Mask at DAMS (Discipline delle arti, della musica e dello spettacolo), a department of The University of Padua. In 2005, the Amleto and Donato Sartori International Mask Museum would be inaugurated with a show written and produced for the occasion by Dario Fo and Franca Rame.
Waler Valeri holds an MFA in dramaturgy from MAXT/ART at Harvard University. In 1973, he founded Sul Porto magazine in Cesenatico, which dealt with cultural affairs in the province. He was Dario Fo and Franca Rame’s personal assistant from 1980 to 1995. In 1981, he won the International Mondello Literary Award for Canzone dell’amante infelice (Guanda). In 1985, he founded and managed the indie magazine, Il Taccuino di Cary in London. In 1990, he published Ora settimana (Corpo 10) with a foreword by Maurizio Cucchi. Walter Valeri’s books include Franca Rame: A Woman on Stage (Perdue University Press, 1999), An Actor’s Theatre (Southern Illinois University Press, 2000), Donna de Paradiso (Editoria e Spettacolo, 2006), and Dario Fo’s Theatre: The Role of Humor in Learning Italian Language and Culture (Yale University Press, 2008). From 2000 to 2007, he founded and directed The Cantiere International Youth Theatre, a project established in collaboration with the City of Forlì and The University of Bologna. In 2005, he published the poetry anthology Deliri Fragili (BESA). He has translated various works of poetry, prose, and theatre into Italian such as, A German Requiem by James Fenton, Carlino by Stuart Hood, Adramelech by Valére Novarina, The Blind by Maurice Maeterlinck, Knepp and Krinski, both by Jorge Goldenberg, and Nobody Dies on Friday by Robert Brustein. In 2006, he founded the international poetry festival Il Porto dei Poeti. His latest works include Visioni in Punto di Morte (Nuovi Argomenti, 54, 2011), Another Ocean (Sparrow Press, 2012), Ora settimana – second edition (Il Ponte Vecchio Press, 2014), Biting the Sun (Boston Haiku Society, 2014), Haiku: My name-Il mio nome (Qudu Publishing, 2015), Parodie del Buio (Il Ponte Vecchio, 2017), and Arlecchino e il Profumo dei Soldi (Il Ponte Vecchio, 2018). He writes for Teatri delle Diversità and Sipario magazines as well as for the online literary journal lamacchinasognante.com. He is also team member of The Poets’ Theatre of Cambridge, Massachusetts.
About the translator:
Marco Remo Zanelli holds a B.A. from Emerson College and an M.A. from Middlebury College. He is both a translator and Italian instructor, as well as an actor and director. He has translated theatrical, academic, literary, journalistic, and historical texts into English, in addition to television subtitles. He has collaborated with people and entities such as American Scientific Frontiers (PBS), historians Nicola Labanca and Angelo Del Boca, Equilibri, filmmaker Marcellino De Baggis, Paoletti Softdrinks, The Forum for the Problems of Peace and War and The Ivory Press, among others. As an actor and/or director, he has worked on Twelfth Night, Romeo and Juliet, The Tempest, A Midsummer’s Night Dream, All’s Well That Ends Well, The Three Sisters, on film productions and with various CBS, ABC, and NBC affiliates in addition to the NBC national TV network. He has also worked as a television promotion writer, producer and editor.
All photos were taken from the Amleto and Donato Sartori International Mask Museum website at http://www.sartorimaskmuseum.it
