the first European festival on creativity

2016 Programme

Event #6

Alessandro Barbero

The space of war. The First Italian War of Independence

The three Italian Wars of Independence are variations on a shared geographical theme: what happens when an army sets off from North-western Italy and attempts to conquer the North-East? The River Po, which divides the Po Valley lengthwise, and its tributaries, have always conditioned the wars fought in this space, ever since Hannibal crossed the Alps and fought his first battle on the river Ticino. When spatial constraints prove so overbearing, few variants are possible: an army’s forces on the ground become decisive – as does the brilliance of their commanders, if available. In 1848, Charles Albert’s Piedmont had an army weaker than the Austrian opponent, and a scarcity of great generals, while the other side had one, Radetzky. And yet, the outcome was not so obvious.

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Alessandro Barbero is a historian and a writer and a tenured professor of Medieval History at Università degli Studi del Piemonte Orientale e Vercelli. He writes for La Stampa and Tuttolibri. He is a contributor on the television program Superquark and the shows Il tempo e la storia and a.C.d.C., broadcast by Rai Storia. His publications include: Benedette guerre. Crociate e jihad («i Libri del Festival della Mente», 2009), Lepanto. La battaglia dei tre imperi («i Libri del Festival della Mente», 2010), Donne, madonne, mercanti e cavalieri. Sei storie medievali («i Libri del Festival della Mente», 2013), published by Laterza; Gli occhi di Venezia (Mondadori, 2011); Il divano di Istanbul (Sellerio, 2011); Dietro le quinte della Storia. La vita quotidiana attraverso il tempo, written with P. Angela (Rizzoli, 2012); Le Ateniesi (Mondadori, 2015); Costantino il vincitore (Salerno Editrice, 2016); Le parole del papa (2016) and Caporetto (2017), published by Laterza. Il divano di Istanbul (2011), Alabama (2021) and Poeta al comando (2022) and Brick for stone (2023), published by Sellerio.


All theevents2016


   

Event #1

Salvatore Veca

An idea of public space

Event #2

Jonathan Safran Foer, Ranieri Polese

That place called “home”

Event #3

Matteo Nucci, Valentina Carnelutti

The space of words: Helen and Odysseus

Event #5

Guido Tonelli

The birth of space (and time)

Event #5 BIS

Guido Tonelli

The birth of space (and time)

Event #6

Alessandro Barbero

The space of war. The First Italian War of Independence

Event #7

Alberto Mantovani

Immunity and the brain: a dialogue between two chief systems. From memory to vaccines.

Event #9

Valerio Magrelli, Andrea Gentile

Tv series: a newly emerged continent

Event #10

Ramak Fazel, Giorgio Vasta, Michele Lupi

Across the American deserts: a voyage through 20th century collective imagination

Event #11

Dominique Cardon

What do algorithms think of?

Event #12

Riccardo Staglianò

That place is gone

Event #13

Lamberto Maffei

The space of rebellion

Event #14

Claudio Bartocci, Chiara Valerio

Other maps, other worlds. Representations of space

Event #16

Giovanni Fabrizio Bignami

From the stars to Life: one, one hundred, one thousand Earths

Event #17

Cino Zucchi, Aldo Colonetti

Architectural space in the past, the present, the future

Event #18

Chiara Saraceno

Families confined and without borders

Event #19

Massimiano Bucchi

The best ideas of our lives. Make room for innovation (the real kind)

Event #20

Matteo Nucci, Valentina Carnelutti

The space of absence: Patroclus and Andromache

Event #21

Giuseppe Cederna

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Event #23

Alessandro Barbero

The space of war. The second Italian War of Independence

Event #24

Marco Balzano, Christian Raimo

School is an idea of the world

Event #26

Piergiorgio Odifreddi

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Event #27

Attilio Brilli

Voyages through spaces real and imagined

Event #28

Gianpiero Dalla Zuanna

Is there space for us all? The future of European migrations

Event #29

Anna Ottani Cavina

When painters left their studios to paint en plein air

Event #30

Bruno Arpaia, Alessandro Zaccuri

The memory of space. The rubble of climate and rubbish in our homes

Event #31Approfonditamente

Alessandro Dal Lago, Serena Giordano, Ex Voto

Graffiti, tags and murals: when art extends to walls

Event #32

Marco Belpoliti

The poetry of space. Words and drawings on that place we call home

Event #34

Giacomo Rizzolatti, Antonio Gnoli

Mirror neurons: anatomy of a revolutionary discovery

Event #35

Gabriella Caramore

The boundaries of the soul and of the world

Event #36

Valentina Carnelutti, Matteo Nucci

The space of dreams: Penelope e Achilles

Event #37

Marco Martinelli

The joy of the chorus

Event #38

Paolo Rumiz, Alessandro Scillitani

The voice of the road. Words, sounds and images gathered along via Appia

Event #39

Alessandro Barbero

The space of war. The Third Italian War of Independence

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