by Maria Manganaro.
During a recent training session on accessibility, with professionals of various kinds from all over Italy (as always), I thought that among the many open and suggested way by President Grassini, podcasting was missing. I thought it while listening (as a non-professional) to Aldo Grassini himself, a generous and magnetic speaker on that mysterious (for many) topic that touch represents in our culture and especially in our daily lives.
The last of the five senses, in terms of importance. The first in terms of prohibition (don’t touch!). Rare and therefore precious in terms of use (symbolically in Italian, “it needs touch” means “be kind”).
Yet, when Grassini talks about exploring reality (in the broadest sense) through touch, he opens to fantastic worlds neglected for reasons I couldn’t analyze (it’s not my profession).
I reflect on it. The sense of touch is underutilized by the able-bodied, sight is tamed. I’m certainly not the first to say that we look without seeing, for much of our time. And the opposite would be impossible. Our brains would suffer from an excess of images to catalog, like that “memorable” young man in Borges’s story who, due to a tragic accident, is unable to forget absolutely anything that happens to him.
And however, the path of still and moving images is, in every field, well-trodden. Touch is largely neglected. Fortunately, Aldo Grassini, with his partner Daniela Bottegoni, has opened his museum to everyone, showcasing a side of inclusivity which is as necessary as fascinating. Thanks to an intuition that became stubborn conviction, for three decades we have been able to run our hands over the curves of nose and curls of hair of Michelangelo’s David, over the body of the Venus of Milo, over the curves of Arnaldo Pomodoro, and through the folds of Valeriano Trubbiani‘s grotesque elegance.
But how did he select and then choose each of the artworks to reproduce? And where did the originals come from? What passionate desire drove Grassini to the freedom to have access to (along with everyone else) precisely those works? Which ones would he have wanted? And, above all, why?
During the training course, the president, pragmatic and idealistic, holds everything together. He provides answers and suggestions, raises doubts, and tackles taboos, captivating the attention of the large audience. No, he’s neither an actor nor a rhetorician. He’s “just” one of those free minds (educated and pertinent) who has found a hearing in public affairs by championing the cause of inclusivity, starting with the need for the visually impaired to use touch, and beyond. It’s no coincidence that Fabio De Chirico, a member of the Directorate General for Contemporary Creativity, participated in the training course on behalf of the Ministry of Culture, with a remote presentation that Grassini described as revolutionary in its openness to concrete, inclusive approaches to artworks, which are recognized as having a specific social role.
Of course, Fabio De Chirico, identifying the “Omero” museum as a structure of excellence, speaks of cities like Turin fully committed to inclusiveness and accessibility, where the people, not artworks, are at the center. He speaks of overcoming economic and linguistic barriers to provide concrete responses to a multiethnic society, in a changing context where the museum can reclaim its function: “a challenge that the Directorate General for Contemporary Creativity is called upon to address, in its guiding role, with a multisensory approach that encompasses visual, olfactory, musical, and performative interactions. “Accessibility”, Fabio De Chirico concluded, “is a vision, it is a question connected to citizenship and, as such, must open itself to new horizons and educational aspects”.
It is precisely here that I reflect on how experience is a vehicle for learning, how the subjective version of events from a recognized expert enriches intellectual and emotional understanding of reality, how it satisfies unexpressed curiosity by triggering mechanisms of trust and anticipation. It would be wonderful- I find myself wishing – if Aldo Grassini’s voice could accompany, through headphones, those visitors to the Omero museum who wanted to hear the verbal translation of the tactile experience of an artwork, the journey of an artwork to the Omero museum, or the piece that the music-loving president associates with a sculpture.