The Leisures of Hercules. Matter and Bodies between Ancient and Modern

Strongly desired by the director of the Archaeological Park of Ercolano, Francesco Sirano, who entrusted its care to Gennaro Carillo, “The Leisures of Hercules. Matter and Bodies between Ancient and Modern" is a series of meetings that will lead to Herculaneum, within a month, from the September 9 to the October 16, protagonists of Italian culture and entertainment. An invitation, made possible also thanks to the contribution of the Campania Region, to share and relive the spaces of the Park, together with those of our culture.

The leitmotif of the cycle – a corollary of two important exhibitions promoted by the Park, respectively dedicated to wood and food – will be material culture, investigated in its anthropological, historical, philosophical aspects and above all as a constitutive element of the Western imagination. The theme of matter and the body will offer the starting point for a broader reflection on the question of desire and appetite, or rather appetites, in a constant coming and going between ancient and modern and a particular attention reserved for eros.

Hence, a program with a strong internal coherence, in a place, the ancient city of Herculaneum, where the disturbing signs of daily life of two millennia ago abound.

It begins Thursday September 9 with the antiquarian Laura Pepe, which will talk about the way the ancients ate and in particular about the representations of food (above all, that of Petronius in the Satyricon). It will be counterpointed by the scenic reading of Anna Bonaiuto, one of the most refined and cultured interpreters on the current scene.

We continue Saturday September 11 with a journey between anthropology and archaeology of the Mediterranean diet, led by two specialists such as Marino Niola ed Elizabeth Moro, of which the volume “Kissing” (Einaudi/La Repubblica).

Saturday 18 it's the turn of an exceptional duo, formed for the occasion: Francis Sirano, archaeologist and director of the Park, will talk with a surgeon and historian of medicine, Gennaro Rispoli, on the most material and corporeal of themes, excrements, of which Ercolano preserves a testimony of formidable value. After the encore of Laura Pepe, which, together with Valentina Carnelutti it deals with the theme of eros, customs and sexual indecency between Herculaneum and Pompeii, and continues with one of the strong points of the cycle: John Bietti, musicologist, will hold a Villa Campolieto a lesson/concert on the barbaric appetite of Mozart/Da Ponte's Don Giovanni, a modern myth par excellence and a concentration of immoderate desires, from sexual to alimentary.

In continuity not only chronologically, but also thematically, with Don Giovanni there will be the lesson, always unpublished, that Corrado Bologna will dedicate to Sancho's sausages and to the theme of food in Cervantes' "Don Quixote" (keeping in mind the lesson of Massimo Mila, who likened Sancho to Sganarello/Leporello, Don Giovanni's servant).

In Ercolano, the city of the Villa dei Papiri, cradle of the Epicurean tradition, a lesson on Lucretius could not be missed. It will be held by a specialist like Ivano Dionigi, who will be counterpointed by the extraordinary acting voice of Massimo Popolizio. Desire and pleasure, crucial themes of both ancient and modern thought, will be treated in a precious lesson by one of the freshest and most innovative voices on the European philosophical scene, that of Ilaria Gaspari. We continue with a lesson/show on the theme of doors, a metaphor for the passage beyond and the perception of other worlds: on stage a very well-known voice from Radio 3 and a face who became very famous during the long months of confinement that we experienced: Edoardo Camurri. The grand finale will be on October 16th, with a meeting that, starting from its title (Critica della ragion cuoca), aims to question the rhetorical excess that accompanies food and its representations: Edoardo Camurri and Marino Niola will dialogue with an undisputed authority on world cuisine, Alfonso Iaccarino.

The locations of the event will be the Ercolano Archaeological Park, the Maiuri Park and Villa Campolieto.

The system of values ​​underlying the new visual identity of the Ercolano Archaeological Park inspires the various enhancement activities promoted during 2021, also giving rise to the exhibition “Gli ozi di Ercole. Materia e corpi tra antico e moderno”.

Myth and history, past and future, research and enhancement, the territory and the ancient city are symbolically united in the sign of the Hercules knot and find, for example, concrete expression in the story proposed to visitors to the Park during the summer evening walks, which represent a suggestive opportunity to discover the myth of the founding hero of the city through the images and references that accompanied the daily life of the ancient Ercolanesi every day, inspiring them with values ​​of courage, resilience and solidarity, as relevant then as today. The exhibitions currently being set up also share the desire to highlight the past and future talents of Ercolano, one focused on the art of woodworking and the creation of furnishings, the other on food and the pleasures of the table.