Thursday 16 May at 7pm, 7 saves they will start from neighborhoods and significant places to cross the
streets crossed by water a year ago and flow into Piazza del Popolo. Here, at 7.30 pm, a concert will begin
collective ritual“The mud ceremony”, to renew the bond that the community of Faenza was able to express during and after the
double flood that hit the city.
The Mud Ceremony is a project that the company Minus twenty / E Production created e
organized, with the contribution of the Ministry of Culture (winner of the 2024 Special Projects Call) and the Emilia-Romagna Region, the patronage of the Municipality of Faenza, the support of Gruppo HERA and GranFrutta Zani.
Consuelo Battiston and Gianni Farina, founders of Menoventi, a theater company based in Faenza, for over
They have been organizing the MEME training course and the related festival for 12 years. In 2024 they decided to
reconfigure this path to 3 free workshops open to citizens – children, teenagers and adults – who from January to May addressed the wound left by the flood with the language of theater and developed a ritual in which all citizens are invited to participate on 16 May.
The Mud Ceremony is rooted in the active and precious collaboration of associations, artistic realities,
cultural and sporting activities, ceramic workshops, schools, farmers’ representatives, informal groups,
professionals and individual citizens, who have joined the proposal to meet again, one year after the double
flood, to walk along the streets crossed by the water and leave a sign of how much in the square
occurred, testifying to the capacity for rebirth that the city has been able to demonstrate.
The seven processions
Departure from Observance Cemetery. A journey guided by the kids who participated in the
MEME Bubble laboratory conducted by Beatrice Cevolani – which embraces the Orto Bertoni neighborhood and overlooks Marzeno and the hill. SAR Team Faenza participates with trained rescue dogs, a representation of local farmers, the musical group La Carampana and the popular dance group, which will enliven the collective finale in the Square.
Piazza Ferniani, meeting point in the area between Via Lapi and Via Calamelli. The procession will follow
blue dragon created by the Fatti d’Arte Association together with volunteers from the neighbourhood, supported by the children of the Il Girasole nursery school and Save the Children.
The procession that starts from Artistation music school will flow into the big parade at the Piazza
Lanzoni, near the Ponte delle Grazie. The children who participated in the MEME Di Voce in Voce workshop conducted by Ermelinda Nasuto will be supported by Scuola Carchidio, Società Ciclistica Faentina, Anffas, Museo Guerrino Tramonti and the ceramic workshops Lia Cavassi and Monica Ortelli.
A composite path, which crosses Corso Garibaldi starting from 4 symbolic places. The participants in the
Fluire workshop for adults – led by Gianni Farina – will lead the parade that starts in front of the venue
of the CGIL in Borgotto. At Piazza San Francesco the realities of Via della Croce and will come together
surroundings: the Pirazzini primary school, the La Vecchia Faenza shop, the Carlo Zauli Museum, the citizens of via
Ponte Romano and all the districts which, in solidarity with the only team of the Palio devastated by the water, will leave
together from the Black Rione. These will be joined by the Faentini Writers and Publishers Committee and the Solaroli Company
at the height of the steps of the Duomo.
Read also: The Parmiani Mill, devastated by the flood. «My 93-year-old father lived there. One year later still no refund”
The Teatro due Mondi will lead the parade starting from Torricelli-Ballardini High Schoolheadquarters of the laboratory
dedicated to the theme of the flood, with the help of the participants in the theater journey Without borders – stories
above and below the water.
The former Salesian complex hosts the departure of the procession led by the Marching Band and composed of
Giuseppe Sarti School of Music, the Tommaso Minardi School of Art and the boys of Faventia Calcio.
There Manfrediana Library will arrive in the square accompanied by the writer Cristiano Cavina. All these journeys are made possible by the fundamental support of the voluntary associations that support the project with great passion and commitment: ANC Faenza, ANC Gruppo Sbarretti, ANPANA Faenza,
National Ass. Carabinieri 85 Unit, Volunteering and Civil Prot. ODV, CVPC Team Faenza, GEV Faenza.
Other entities have collaborated in various capacities in the realization of this ceremony and will gather
directly in Piazza del Popolo at 7.30pm for the start of the ritual: Fototeca Manfrediana, Independentpoetry, Museo Ivo Sassi, Cantieri Danza APS, as well as the ceramists Antonella Ravagli, Andrea Salvatori, Maria Cristina Sintoni, Mirco Denicolò.
The collective ritual: the mud ceremony
Each group involved will be asked to leave a mark in Piazza del Popolo to share
symbolically one’s own experience, but also and above all to find new energy in sharing to start again and look to the future. In the center of the square, the heart of the city, a
scenography, curated by the architect Andrea Montesi, who will welcome the signs and acts that constitute the ritual
collective: a large river-snake, whose head recalls the profile of the Ponte delle Grazie.
«On May 16th we will meet in the places devastated by the flood. We will gather in parks, in cultural and sporting venues, in schools, in shops, in the streets. Like a vital current we will meet to give body and voice to the processions that will converge in the square to celebrate the Mud Ceremony. We want to transform held back emotions into song. We want to feel close once again to renew the solidarity that has kept the city standing. We want to highlight the dignity of those who have lost everything”, say Consuelo Battiston and Gianni Farina, founders of Menoventi and creators of the Mud Ceremony.
Read also: Romagna underwater. When it all started a year ago
