L'Italo-Americano

L'Italo-Americano THURSDAY, AUGUST 20, 2026 www.italoamericano.org 4 G i u l i a M o n - zani won the 52nd Incon- t r o N a z i o n a l e dei Madonnari at Grazie di Curtatone on August 15 with a pavement work that w i l l r e m a i n i n t h e v i l l a g e until rain erases it. The 27- year-old artist from Filago, n e a r B e r g a m o , t o o k f i r s t p l a c e a m o n g t h e m a e s t r i madonnari for the second year in a row. H e r t w i n s i s t e r , A l i c e , placed third. Between them came Valentino Ciusani, while Kanako Matsumoto of Tokyo and Enrique León E s p i n o z a o f G u a n a j u a t o won the other divisions. For two nights, 136 participants worked on the asphalt beside the Santuario della Beata V e r g i n e d e l l e G r a z i e , watched by visitors moving around them and careful, one hopes, about where they put their feet. The winning artwork rep- resents one of the starkest episodes in the life of Fran- c i s o f A s s i s i : s t a n d i n g before his father, the young man returns his clothes and gives up his family's wealth and social position. In Rin- uncia agli Averi, Renuncia- tion of Possessions, Giulia opens that moment into four connected images, following a decision as it moves from thought into action. The jury c a l l e d i t a n " i n n e r chronophotograph." Giulia told the Corriere della Sera that Francis's decision to remove his old clothes and take up the habit began with "an impulse and an urgent need," the same urgency that jury president Peter Ass- mann saw at the center of the work. Speaking directly to L'I- talo-Americano after the competition, Giulia admitted that the result had surprised her. "Winning this year was a little unexpected for me. S i n c e I w o n l a s t y e a r , I wasn't expecting another award, and above all I chose a s u b j e c t t h a t I t h o u g h t might not be appreciated enough to win first prize, because it wasn't a particu- larly traditional portrayal." F r a n c i s w a s t h e shared subject of this year's meeting, held dur- ing the eighth centenary of his death, in 1226. Italy has also restored October 4 as a national holiday in his honor beginning in 2026, recogniz- i n g a f i g u r e w h o s e i d e a s about fraternity, peace and care for creation continue to belong to the country's pub- lic life as well as its religious history. Francis is Italy's p a t r o n s a i n t , t h e o f f i c i a l patron of ecologists and, for many people, the protector of animals. After another year marked by war, envi- ronmental destruction and n o s h o r t a g e o f c r u e l t y toward living things, asking artists to interpret his mes- sage hardly felt like an exer- cise in medieval devotion. The home of the event, Grazie, a hamlet of Curta- tone a few miles from Man- tua, has only about 530 resi- d e n t s a n d b e l o n g s t o I Borghi più belli d'Italia. It stands at the edge of the Mincio wetlands, and much of its life revolves around the sanctuary. Francesco Gonza- g a o r d e r e d t h e p r e s e n t church built in 1399 after a plague afflicting Mantua had passed; it was consecrated in 1 4 0 6 . I n 1 4 2 5 , G i a n - francesco Gonzaga estab- lished a free market for pil- grims arriving for the Feast of the Assumption, which, o v e r t i m e , b e c a m e t h e Antichissima Fiera delle Grazie. Today, the event brings more than 100,000 people to the village every August. The madonnari have an equally long and fascinating history. Traveling from town to town, they drew sacred images near churches and pilgrimage sites and received whatever coins passersby chose to leave. Their name came, quite simply, from the Madonnas they so often por- trayed. By the twentieth cen- tury, the practice had almost disappeared and was still commonly dismissed as beg- g i n g , b u t G r a z i e h e l p e d change its status. The first organized meeting there, held in 1973, gave a public home to a tradition that had s u r v i v e d l a r g e l y t h r o u g h wandering artists and family memory. More than half a century later, it is one of the principal international gath- erings of pavement painters. Speaking to La Repubbli- ca, Giulia said she loves the f a c t t h a t a m a d o n n a r o ' s w o r k s a r e " m o r e e a s i l y a c c e s s i b l e " t h a n a r t k e p t i n s i d e m u s e u m s ; A l i c e , meanwhile, has described the short life of the pictures a s a n i n v i t a t i o n t o c a r p e diem: if people want to see t h e m , t h e y h a v e t o d o i t while they are still there. The sisters came to the pavement painting tradition through their mother, who partici- Until the rain comes: the Madonnari of Grazie and their vanishing art FRANCESCA BEZZONE NEWS & FEATURES TOP STORIES PEOPLE EVENTS CONTINUED TO PAGE 6 An artist at work during one of the past editions of the Incontro Nazionale dei Madonnari in Grazie (Photo courtesy of Incontro Nazionale dei Madonnari di Grazie - Antichissima Fiera delle Grazie/TGC Eventi)

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