50 Giorni Festival--Art on Film

50 Giorni di Cinema Internazionale a Firenze is exactly that--

50  Days of International Film screened at the Cinema Odeon.
Comprising numerous festivals dedicated to various film genres, 50 Days includes
new French releases (France Odeon) and documentaries (Festival dei Popoli),
as well as movies focusing on women and women's issues
(Festival Internazionale di Cinema e Donne).

Above is the cocktail party which inaugurated 50 Giorni in piazza Strozzi.

Pictures of this event were taken by faithful Beautiful Florence 
photographer Avigayil Kelman.
Through Sunday, 50 Giorni is showcases Lo Schermo dell'Arte
(Art on Film), examining the relationship between cinema and contemporary art, with a specific
focus on artists and artistic films.

Art on Film features events and screenings categorized in different sections, including:
Sguardi (Viewpoints), international films on contemporary art;
Cinema d'Artista, artistic documentaries by artists; and
Mobiles, works by an international artist who works with moving images and new media.  The latter is
set at the Cango--Cantieri Goldonetta in via Santa Maria,

Above is not the part of the Mobiles installation but another event within
50 Giorni's inaugural party.  Students from Florence's photography school
Studio Marangoni were taking pictures of invited guests on an open set
in the Odeon facing piazza Strozzi.  If the man to the right look familiar, it is because
he is Giorgio Bonsanti, an art historian formerly the head of Florence's world-renowned restoration laboratories at the Opificio delle Pietre Dure.

Tomorrow (Nov. 24), Focus on, a new section of Art on Film will debut
 (6 pm), spotlighting the cinema of Isaac Julien, who will be present.
Above is a shot from one of the works that will be screened:  Baltimore (2003).
The recipient of an award at the Cologne Biennale, Baltimore is a tribute to African-American
actor and movie director Melvin Van Peebles, who in the film follows in the footsteps of an
Afro-Cyborg (pictured)
through museum spaces in Baltimore.

This image is from another of Julien's short films on Saturday's program.

True North (2004) is the story of the African-American Matthew Henson,

among one of the first to reach the North Pole along with Robert E. Peary.

On Sunday (Nov. 25), the recipient of the 2011 Schermo dell'Arte award will be shown at

the Odeon at 9:45 pm.  Titled Per troppo amore:  Incompiuto Siciliano (For Too Much Love, Unfinished in Sicily), it examines the impact of 

too many construction projects on Italy's environment.

Another problem Per troppo amore takes a look at are the many unfinished and abandoned building sites that deface the Italian countryside.  The phenomenon is notoriously most evident in Sicily (see Mt. Etna blowing steam in the picture?).  I, too, remember seeing many "eco monsters"

driving through Sicily years ago with my heart family, the D'Orazio-Pergolizzis, who were visiting from the States.

Beautiful Florence has give you an antipasto; for the full 50 Giorni program (through mid-December), visit www.odeon.intoscana.it

Buona visione!