L'Italo-Americano

L'Italo-Americano THURSDAY, JANUARY 11, 2018 www.italoamericano.org 6 FRANCESCA BEZZONE P hotography is an incredible versatile form of visual expres- sion, yet there are instances when only painters, with their brushes, char- coals and colors, can truly cap- ture the essence of a place or the soul of a person. There is some- thing so incredibly intimate in the process of hand-moulding reality on canvas with hues, shade and light, spiritual and car- nal all at once. Sometimes, it happens because of the emotions and secret feelings the artist har- bors for his or her subject, some- times because of a creative process at once reflective and frenzied, rational and incompre- hensible. Other times, though, the subject does it all by itself, leading the mind and the hand of the artist, because its energy and soul are so powerful it couldn't happen in any other way. Renato Guttuso's Vucciria, masterpiece of Italian Neoreal- ism, is one of these paintings: the vividness of its colors, the seem- ingly haphazard composition - which nevertheless holds within a crystalline harmony - the full, luscious volumes of each figure are so perfectly and quintessen- tially representative of Palermo and her markets one could almost imagine the city itself told Guttuso how to portray her. Yes, because la Vucciria, Paler- mo's most popular market, really is a piece the city's soul, home to all of her idiosyncrasies: there are colors, scents, music, voices and cheerfulness, but also confu- sion, stench, filth. Somehow though, and I say it because I experienced it with my own heart and eyes when I was there, one wouldn't change a single thing. La Vucciria is Palermo, and it is beautiful. Visitors, I am sure, tend to get mesmerized by La Vucciria, just as it had happened to me the first time I went, its heady combina- tion of of people, spices, colorful fruit and vegetables, fresh fish, meat making them believe to stroll in a parallel world. Yet, not many know the market has also a very interesting history, that goes hand in hand with that of Sicily itself, and that today it has also become the go-to place for food- ies and night life lovers. Indeed, la Vucciria, which lies in the old Quartiere della Loggia, today part of the Tribunali- Castellammare area, roots its ori- gins in the Middle Ages and gets its name from the French word boucherie, which can both mean butcher store or slaughter house: it was, at least originally, known especially as a meat market. "Bocciria," it was called then, and it didn't take long before merchants from all over the South of Europe, Genoa, Pisa, Lucca, Catalunia, Venice, set their "logge" at its very heart; already then, one could find everything at la Vucciria, includ- ing rare and precious goods. And already then, like today, this was a place of sounds as much as it was of scents and light, so much so its name turned to be syn- onym, in Palermo, with racket and noise. With time, so, la Vucciria became known for more than its meats, in fact, fish soon got to be its main trade, as the market bor- dered with the old port of la Cala. An old Palermitan expression wanted the impossible being like "when the ground at la Vucciria is dry," unachievable feature because of the habit to constantly spray fish with water to keep it fresh. But la Vucciria was more than a market: along its streets one could find plenty of special- ized shops, their presence wit- nessed today by the very names of many vie, like via dell'Argen- teria Nuova and via dell'Argente- ria Vecchia, once home to gold- smiths or via dei Maccheronai, where women would prepare and sell fresh pasta. And then, there was via dei Tintori, via dei Cal- zolai, via dei Coltellieri. In this sense, la Vucciria with- out a doubt still bears the history of Palermo on its sleeve, yet it has changed profoundly. Of Gut- tuso's painting, visitors only find hints here and there, sufficient however to make of it an incredi- bly lively and fascinating spot. Changes are not always negative, though, and modern la Vucciria has plenty of positive features; it has become a symbol of Paler- mo's essence and lifestyle and, even more importantly, of its incredible street food, of the tastes and products typical of the city's tradition and, more at large, of those of the island as a whole. It is a place of inebriating flavors and scents, that becomes lively also in the evenings, when people from all social back- grounds and cultures gather in its alleys and streets to socialize, eat and drink. It has changed, yes. But there's still plenty to enjoy. Very recently, La Vucciria turned international, with the cre- ation of an itinerant concept store that opened in Palermo first and has just landed in New York, where it will soon open, then to move in a few months to London, then China and Japan. La Vuc- ciria store is the brainchild of Antonio di Dio, Diana de Conci- ni and of Mario Stancampiano and his team. In it, visitors will find all that is "Sicily," from olive oil and Modica chocolate, all the way to jewellery and pot- tery, a true treasure chest of all that the island can offer. The accent is, of course, placed on the idea of tradition, culture and authenticity, an accent that wants to portray Sicily and its products at their best and most genuine. Visiting La Vucciria concept store will never be the same as visiting the real thing in Palermo, and then again, the real thing is no longer, perhaps, the same as what Guttuso so aptly and beauti- fully depicted in 1974. Yet, the soul of the city lingers, at la Vuc- ciria, and we visitors can still catch beautiful glimpses of it, reason enough to visit and to take in all that remains of the old mar- ket, as well as embracing the new that this corner of Palermo has to offer. La Vucciria, mirror to Palermo's soul LA VITA ITALIANA TRADITIONS HISTORY CULTURE La Vucciria is the most popular of Palermo's markets

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