Round table
Building U6 AGORÀ, Aula Massa (Piazza dell’Ateneo Nuovo 1, Milano)| 09.30 H
Interviewed speakers are: Paola Pallottino (illustration scholar), Silvia Vecchini(writer), Luogo Comune ( writer and illustrator),Adelchi Galloni (illustrator).
Interviewers: Lorenzo Cantatore (professor of Pedagogy History, University of Rome Tre), Giovanna Zoboli (writer and editor), Antonella Abbatiello (illustrator), Martino Negri (professor of Pedagogy History, University of Milan- Bicocca)
Childhood literature and specifically illustrated books, conceived as a literary form for its peculiar esthetics and structure, have seen an extraordinary blossoming, especially in Italy. Nevertheless, this blossoming has a lot of shadows, as some observers of the Italian editorial scene have pointed out.
The project “Costruttori di Libri” (Book builders) was created to offer education professionals, but not just them, an opportunity to meet and ponder on the richness and complexity of this world; this will be done not only facing the complexities of childhood contemporary literature but also underlining the creative role every single personality has. It also deals with the reality of the book as the result of a collaboration
between multiple perspectives and professional skills.
A field where various instances, apparently contradictory, dialogue and confront themselves: cultural, commercial, esthetic, and educationalist instances.
The following initiative is supposed to have a semestral frequency (every cycle will be repeated twice in an academic year; November in Rome and May in Milan). This initiative will consist of a series of meetings where representatives of Italian childhood literature (authors, illustrators, editors, and graphic designers) will be publicly interviewed by a specialized critic of the field.
These interviews will have the goal to arise epistemological and cultural horizons and theoretical-critic inspirations very important to students of Educational Sciences (future educators and pre-scholar and primary school teachers); they will be precious also for a wider public to foster the building of a conscious approach to children books. This approach will help the public see these books as a “complete” artistic product with multiple and complex meanings which can be used as an irreplaceable instrument to educate an insight on today’s world (both children and adults).
What is the meaning of a book intended as a material and cultural object in the education of new generations? Moreover, what could be the role of a combination of written culture and visual literacy in an effective educational project also capable of arising emotional, cognitive, and cultural skills? These are the main questions that will solicit in this initiative, the need to ponder.
The participation of students of Educational Sciences will be prepared by an explorational work and by pondering on the literary objects examined by professors of the Universities which promote the project (Cantatore e Negri).
THE EXHIBITION AND MEETINGS
Every module of the initiative requires the presence of four authors and their respective interviewers accompanied by deepening exhibitions on the books of the interviewed ( both illustrators and writers), edited by the interviewers. These exhibitions will aim to re-build the entire generative process, starting from the project to the sketches, original boards, documents ( texts, objects, images, strips, notebooks, other books, etc.) that contributed to their birth.
From these encounters, it will be possible to create publications that will collect the interview texts.
PRESENTED BOOKS:
1. P. Pallottino, Le figure per dirlo. Storia delle illustratrici italiane. Roma, Treccani 2019
Dall’atlante delle immagini. Note di iconologia. Nuoro, Ilisso 1992
Storia dell’illustrazione italiana [1988]. Lucca, La Casa Usher, 2020
2. S. Vecchini, Prima che sia notte. Milano, Bompiani, 2020
Una frescura al centro del petto. L’albo illustrato nella crescita e nella vita interiore dei bambini. Milano, Topipittori, 2019;
Acerbo sarai tu. Milano, Topipittori, 2020
In mezzo alla fiaba. Milano, Topipittori, 2015
Le parole possono tutto. Milano, Il Castoro, 2021
C’è questo in me. Milano, Topipittori, 2019
Ogni volta. Roma, Lapis, 2021
3. Luogo Comune, Il grande libro delle navi. Roma, Sinnos, 2020
R. Fancellu Balestrucci, Annie. Il vento in tasca. Illustrated by Luogo Comune, Roma, Sinnos, 2019
4. Hamelin (a cura di), Adelchi Galloni. Bologna, Hamelin, 2019
A. Galloni, La tigre a scacchi. San Giuliano Terme (Pisa), Barta, 2018
B. Pitzorno, Clorofilla dal cielo blu [1975]. Illustrated by A. Galloni, Milano, Mondadori, 2018