CHIERI-FLORENCE NODE

A project between two excellences

of textile culture

ARCHIVES NIGHT 2023

9th June, 18:00-21:00

Historical archive of the Foundation

Via Giovanni Demaria 10, Chieri.

Once again this year the Chierese Foundation for Textiles and the Textile Museum is participating in the "Archivissima" review with an exhibition event in the "Night of the Archives", presenting the "Nodo Chieri-Florence" project, the result of the synergy started in 2021 with the Lisio Silk Art Foundation in Florence.

A tempera drawing from the "Serra e Carli" Chieri collection from the 20th century was studied in the historic Florentine factory to create the warp and weft version. The "Nodo Chieri-Firenze" project consisted of the elaboration of the technical drawing for weaving the original motif on a jacquard loom, drilling, binding and assembly of the cardboards, insertion of the irons on the loom and finally weaving and shearing. The result is a splendid cut velvet, produced in three color variants - blue, red, green.

The event will be attended by Elena Baistrocchi, Director of the Lisio Silk Art Foundation, Melanie Zefferino, President of the Chierese Textile Museum Foundation, Laura Vaschetti and Laura Davin, respectively Vice-President and head of the historical archive, Marinella Bianco, titular archivist of Acta Progetti and collaborator of both Foundations as well as Lisa Fontana, artist and teacher of textile art, Sara Cavaliere, young restorer of textile materials and artefacts and Vincenzo Tedesco, head of the Historical Archive of the City of Chieri.

Combining the different traditions of two manufacturing excellences, that of Chieri more oriented towards cotton, and that of rich Florence, more focused on wool and silk, the creative path just outlined in a 20th century drawing that had remained only a graphic representation was completed of an “idea for fabric”. Its contemporary creation, beyond Chieri, infuses new life into the Historical Archive of the institution founded in 1997 by Armando Brunetti (1934-2015) with the intention of preserving the culture of textiles for generations to come».

At the same time, this joint initiative is also an enrichment for the Florentine Foundation which owes its existence to Fidalma Lisio (1910-2001), who wanted to safeguard and transmit the Art of Silk by transforming the Giuseppe Lisio Manufacture into a Foundation in 1971 , and bringing it into the third millennium.

The "knot" that links the Chieri Archive and the Florence weaving mill is the result of a collaboration that can be seen as a "journey" between two cities with a strong textile vocation but also between two realities that combine historical memory and contemporary developments. The "Nodo Chieri-Florence" project therefore fits well into the thematic framework —Carnet de voyage of "Archivissima" 2023, where "travel is exploration..., a journey that would not exist without the story of what has been".

Thus the textures imagined in a drawing and woven on a loom have become "living signs, in which emotions resonate, without which everything would remain a silent sign".