L'Italo-Americano

THURSDAY, MARCH 5, 2026 www.italoamericano.org 10 L'Italo-Americano T h e r e a r e m a n y w a y s t o t e l l t h e s t o r y o f a p e r - s o n ' s l i f e , a n d when the subject is someone well known, the possibilities multiply. Among the most evocative languages a v a i l a b l e t o u s i s t h a t o f i m a g e s . P h o t o g r a p h s , w h e t h e r c a n d i d o r p o s e d , capture moments that often feel almost magical precisely because they seem to reveal life in its unguarded form. They are fragments of time, s o m e t i m e s r e s e m b l i n g scenes glimpsed through a keyhole: moments quietly s t o l e n , o c c a s i o n a l l y e v e n without the subject realizing that a piece of their life has just been preserved. On January 22, the Polo Culturale San Lorenzo in Agrigento opened an exhibi- t i o n f e a t u r i n g t h i r t y p h o - t o g r a p h s b y A n g e l o P i t r o n e , a p h o t o g r a p h e r who has long documented the life of Sicily with a cam- era that is always attentive to t h e d e c i s i v e i n s t a n t . T h e images are also gathered in a book titled Album Camil- leri, with a preface by Salva- tore Ferlita and promoted by the Central Library of the S i c i l i a n R e g i o n " A l b e r t o Bombace." Over the course of his long career, Pitrone chronicled the life of Agrigento and its province through photogra- phy. His work also focused on writers and artists, figures who, in turn, narrated the history and identity of the places where they were born, l i v e d , a n d c r e a t e d t h e i r works. T h e e x h i b i t i o n a r r i v e s shortly after the celebrations marking the centenary of the b i r t h o f A n d r e a C a m i l l e r i ( S e p t e m b e r 6 , 1 9 2 5 ) , t h e novelist, playwright, televi- sion writer, poet, and story- teller whose work is loved across the world. His books – a n d a b o v e a l l h i s m o s t famous character, Inspector Montalbano, protagonist of the widely successful RAI television series – have been translated into many lan - guages, including English, French, German, Spanish, Catalan, Portuguese, Irish, Russian, Polish, Greek, Nor- wegian, Hungarian, Japan- ese, Hebrew, and Croatian. I n A l b u m C a m i l l e r i , Pitrone portrays the writer, who died on July 17, 2019, through his deep relation- s h i p w i t h S i c i l y , t h e l a n d that shaped his imagination. T h e p h o t o g r a p h s t r a c e C a m i l l e r i ' s c o n n e c t i o n t o P o r t o E m p e d o c l e , h i s birthplace; to Agrigento, the provincial capital with its distinctive cultural heritage; a n d t o R a c a l m u t o , t h e starting point of the Strada degli Scrittori, an itinerary that retraces places inhabit- ed and loved by writers who influenced generations of readers. Camilleri himself served t h e r e , t o g e t h e r w i t h G i u s e p p e D i p a s q u a l e , a s artistic director of the Teatro Regina Margherita. The the- ater had remained closed for more than forty years before reopening in 2003, a project s t r o n g l y s u p p o r t e d b y Leonardo Sciascia, one of Racalmuto's most celebrated citizens, who unfortunately did not live to see it realized. F o r m o r e t h a n t h r e e decades, Pitrone worked at the Agrigento Superinten- dency, and during that time, he became perhaps the pho- tographer who most vividly captured the faces of Sicily's great writers: Leonardo Sci- a s c i a , V i n c e n z o C o n s o l o , Gesualdo Bufalino, Matteo Collura, and Andrea Camil- leri himself. His lens also t u r n e d t o w a r d f i g u r e s beyond Sicily, including the R o m a n n o v e l i s t A l b e r t o Moravia and the Argentine writer Manuel Puig. Pitrone is deeply attached to black-and-white photog- r a p h y , a c h o i c e t h r o u g h which he expresses the emo- tional depth that guides his work. The absence of color sharpens attention to ges- ture, expression, and atmos- phere. In this way, Album Camilleri becomes a visual narrative that explores the writer's life, his theater, and the places that nourished his memory. In Camilleri's imagina- tion, Porto Empedocle itself was transformed into Vigà- ta, the fictional town that f o r m s t h e s e t t i n g f o r t h e entire Montalbano series. Yet the story also reaches further back. Camilleri was connected to Luigi Piran- dello through family ties: his paternal grandmother, Carolina Morello, was a first c o u s i n o f t h e g r e a t p l a y - wright and Nobel Prize win- n e r , w h o w a s b o r n i n t h e district known as Caos, a rural area belonging to Agri- gento but situated halfway b e t w e e n A g r i g e n t o a n d Porto Empedocle. A n d i t w a s p r e c i s e l y i n P o r t o E m p e d o c l e t h a t Andrea Camilleri and Pier- l u i g i P i r a n d e l l o , t h e l a s t d i r e c t g r a n d s o n o f L u i g i Pirandello, met in 2010 for the inauguration of the exhi- bition Ritorno alla Marina, d e d i c a t e d t o t h e w o r k o f Fausto Pirandello, Luigi's son and Pierluigi's father. The moment reaffirmed the l a s t i n g b o n d b e t w e e n t h e P i r a n d e l l o a n d C a m i l l e r i families and this town in the province of Agrigento. P o r t o E m p e d o c l e i t s e l f has a long history. Today, it is an important port con- n e c t i n g S i c i l y w i t h t h e Pelagie Islands and lies close to Scala dei Turchi. Origi- nally known as Marina di G i r g e n t i , t h e t o w n l a t e r adopted its current name in honor of the Greek philoso- pher Empedocles. It official- ly became a city in 1863. T h e s i x t e e n t h - c e n t u r y T o w e r o f C h a r l e s V , o n c e built as a defensive structure protecting the harbor, still stands today and has been repurposed as a venue for cultural events. Not far away lies the birthplace of Luigi Pirandello. The origins of the port are ancient, too: in Greek and Roman times, it served as the maritime outlet of Agri- g e n t o , l o c a t e d n e a r t h e mouth of the Akragas River c l o s e t o t h e b e a c h o f S a n Leone. After the Arab con- quest, the harbor became important both for trade and for military activity. Com- mercial exchanges were par- ticularly active with North Africa, especially through the export of salt. With the a r r i v a l o f t h e N o r m a n s , trade routes shifted toward Italian ports such as Genoa, Pisa, and Amalfi. The port continued to prosper under the Swabians, but during the Spanish period, commercial a c t i v i t y g r a d u a l l y m o v e d t o w a r d G e l a a n d L i c a t a , which were closer to Spain. Despite periods of decline c a u s e d b y d i s e a s e a n d attacks along Sicily's south- e r n c o a s t , t h e h a r b o r r e m a i n e d s t r a t e g i c a l l y important. Charles V rein- forced the defensive tower protecting the port, and later the Bourbons constructed a proper masonry harbor. In 1853, Ferdinand II declared it an autonomous munici- pality under the name Molo di Girgenti. Ten years later, on January 4, 1863, King Victor Emmanuel II autho- r i z e d t h e m u n i c i p a l i t y t o adopt the name Porto Empe- docle. O n c e a g a i n , A n g e l o Pitrone offers us the gift of his art. Through his pho- tographs he tells not only the story of the writer, the director, the man of theatre and television, but also of t h e p l a c e s t h e a u t h o r describes—sometimes even renaming them for the pur- poses of storytelling. These places are seen through the a t t e n t i v e e y e o f s o m e o n e who does not simply narrate t h r o u g h h i s c h o s e n l a n - g u a g e , p h o t o g r a p h y . H i s work is also a search for the perfect image: the one that, whether it portrays a person or a landscape, reveals the soul and essence of its sub- ject. Unaware, that subject will later find itself in the d a r k r o o m , w a i t i n g t o emerge from the darkness in a vivid and truthful photo- graph capable of revealing, precisely, the essence of that "once upon a time" which, in Pitrone's work, continues with "and it is still here," just as Album Camilleri does in this case. From Vigàta to television: the landscapes behind Camilleri's stories TERESA DI FRESCO Left, portrait of Andrea Camilleri, 2000 (Photo courtesy of Angelo Pitrone); right: the waterfront of Porto Empedocle at dusk, the Sicilian port town where Andrea Camilleri was born and the real-life inspiration for the fictional Vigàta in his Montalbano novels (Photo: Sean Pavone/Dreamstime.com) LIFE PEOPLE PLACES EVENTS

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