La Macina di San Cresci

www.chianticom.com

residence for artistsGreve in Chianti

La Macina di San Crescivia San Cresci 150022 Greve in Chianti (FI)Italytel/fax . + 39 055 8544793info@chianticom.com

We are located above Greve in Chianti in the heart of Tuscany,between two great cities of the Renaissance: Florence & Siena.

Here the work of nature and the work of man has shaped a unique landscape.

Vineyards and olive groves interspersed with farmhouses, turreted castles and fortresses andancient hamlets: this is the typical Chianti landscape, possibly the best-known of all ofTuscany.

From the town of Greve in Chianti, we are on the road winding through the hills that connectsthe Greve Valley from the Pesa Valley, here is the parish of San Cresci which in the past wasof noteworthy importance.

The Pieve of San Cresci is the oldest in the Chianti region, and is found in ecclesiasticaldocuments as far back as the year 948. The Pieve is a part of an architectural complexcomposed of the Church, the Chapel of SS.Sacramento and the parish house. The cellars ofthe Pieve are part of the parish house with their entry directly on to the communal road.

They have been recently restored, following the rigid requirements of the Ministero per i BeniCulturali ed Architettonici and are blessed with a beautiful view of Tuscan hills and themedieval village of Montefioralle.The multiroomed cantine retain objects typical of countrytradition and exude the charm of a place imbued with more than 1000 years of history.

During your stay you will have the opportunity to go on several outings and visit to thesurrondings, which abound in places of special naturalistic and historical significance.

View from the residence

La Macina di San Cresci is a place for creation, presentationand documentation of contemporary art in all its forms.

Year 948The Architectural complex

EVERYTHING BELONGS TO THOSE WHO IMPROVE

La Pieve di San Cresci a Monte FicalleInfinite Source of Surprise and Wonder

Gianfranco Sanguinetti

“…I would like to be in Piazza della Signoriawaiting for you, or in the garden of Pieve (di San Cresci)

when you come to us…”

Guy Debord, Lettera a M.F., November 7, 1972in Correspondence, Volume 4, Fayard, 2004

In beautiful or terrible weather, it is my habit, when I find myself at my house in Chianti, to go out andwander, either by motorcycle or car, in this vast countryside so well civilized since medieval times. History hasleft Chianti a perfect example of unitary urbanism, which is dispersed throughout the region and which we sooften admire in Renaissance painting.Two or three years ago I found myself wandering past the place where I had lived with Guy Debord and hiswife years ago. The place is in the heart of Chianti. It is the rectory of the little Pieve di San Cresci di MonteFicalle, maybe the oldest parish church of the region (9th century), not far from the village of Greve. Whilearriving in this manner at our former house, I saw a man come out of it. I told him that once I too had livedin this superb house. To my surprise, he invited me to enter! All remained as it had been before, but at thesame time all had been perfectly and philologically restored, not reconstructed. It was as if I looked at aphotograph-- time seemed to stand still here as a sign of respect to this august place. The courtyard, thecloister, the well, the garden, the house, the cantinas, the mill for the olives, the kitchen, the rooms, thebathroom, etc., all had maintained their own original historical character. It might well have been feared thatan old construction so noble as this would have entered into the hands of a more vulgar circuit, of the Relais& Chateax type, to accommodate people who have nothing but to spend money. What a surprise, instead, tofind the place even more beautiful than it had been!

I was giving compliments to my hosts about the beauty of this restoration, and told them that Guy Debordwould often repeat a maxim of Bertolt Brecht’s: “everything belongs to those who improve.” I learned thatthe man who had just welcomed me into his house is great designer of the period in which Italy was stillproducing them: Duccio Trassinelli. And since I had with me a type of pecorino made by Sardinian shepherdfriend, as well as a piece of pork cooked over wood, his wife Mimma improvised a tasty dinner. We quicklybecame friends.

It is thanks to this happy encounter that I am once again able to marvel at Pieve di San Cresci, while visitingthe exhibition of inlaid furniture designed by Ettore Sottsass and built by celebrated artisan Andrea Fedeli. Ihad known Ettore in the mid-1960s, thanks to Fernanda Pivano. As it is known, Ettore Sottsass was part ofthe 1956 First World Congress of Free Artists, held in Alba, Italy. He participated with Asger Jorn, Pinot-Gallizio, Constant, Wollman, Simondo, Baj, Fontana, Appel, Corneille, Matta, D’Angelo, Scanavino, etc. Fromthe Bauhaus Immaginista and from the Internationale Lettriste, presented at this congress, there arose inItaly in the following years the International Situationists.

View from the studios

The Pieve di San Cresci remains a place of spirit and genuine encounters, perhaps one of themost singular in Italy. He who sees it is so amazed as to fall in love with it. This is just whathappened to me in 1972, and led me to rent it from the parish priest in three minutes withoutthinking. Then, the same coup de foudre overtook Guy Debord and when I had to depart, Ileft la Pieve to him out of friendship.Over the centuries, the succeeding parish priests continually improved the place, constructingalso, in the middle of the countryside, a little garden in the image of Earthly Paradise, with aview like that of Ambrogio Lorenzetti over the hills, vines, olive groves, forest, and the Castleof Montefioralle. From here Amerigo Vespucci departed to discover that America was notIndia, and from Greve Giovanni da Verrazzano departed to discover the bay of New York andCanada. They had departed from here to land in place far away, and we, who come from afar,land here. In that paradise-like garden there were all kinds of fruit and flowers: palm, apple,vines, olives, almond, pear, fig, plum, chestnut. There was shade and sun, a luxury calm andvoluptuous. In short, it was everything Epicurus wanted in his famous garden.t would not be any other way but that the old name of the church (nomen omen), holds agreat surprise: San Cresci a Monte Ficalle was the saint whom they recommended in medievaltimes to men who had erection problems, and Boccaccio said that this saint was alsovenerated by certain women, religious according to their own manner,” and that one of theseheroines made a bold and salacious allusion, harsh and almost blasphemous: “along with theothers, in great devotion I serve San Cresci in Valcava, to whom the women of this countrywish very well” (Decameron, II, 7, 109). Whether in Valcava or at Monte Ficalle, thus SanCresci is venerated.This Pieve is special for me as a synonym for surprise. It is known that for Montesquieusurprise is the very principle of beauty and pleasure that it gives us, because surprisegenerates this “invisible charm, this natural grace that we must necessarily call je ne saisquoi.” (Montesquieu, Essai sur le gout, 1757).There is one thing, however, that we do not have to wonder at: why a place so beautiful andstrong, able to resist the vulgarity and crimes of our century, is inhabited by Duccio andMimma Trassinelli, and guards work so extraordinary as that of Sottsass and Fedeli. In this it isproven: everything belongs to those who improve.

I

(1)

(1) In Italian “crescere” means “to rise”—San Cresci therefore also becomes a synonym for the male sex. The old name of MonteFicalle evokes the word “fica,” which indicates the female sex.

-----------

The Church

Exhibition/ConcertTheater/MusicStages for organists

“L’ultima collezione diEttore Sottsass, 1999”Exhibition, 2010

Activities:

Conferences/Meeting

Projects/ExhibitionPerformance/Workshop This is an ideal situation to live and work: a place for meeting and discussion,

a place of contemplation and creativity, a place of exhibition, a place whichgives the opportunity to exchange experiences, in order to promote dialoguebetween different culture.

Studios space and gallery

La Macina di San Cresci offers artists an opportunity to work for an extended period of time ina social environment that is quite different from the urban milieu that is the usual context ofproduction and distribution of the contemporary arts. This new experience provides artists witha major stimulus to experiment with new ideas, approaches and modes of production,encouraging artists to rethink and renegotiate their role in such unfamiliar social contexts. Italso invites communities to be receptive to creative practices that don’t conform to traditionalexpectations.

Projects/ExhibitionPerformance/Workshop

The quiet, rural beauty of Chianti provides and ideal setting for intensestudio work and contemplation.Images cannot truly communicate the look, feel, and spirit of this place.

Designstudios and exhibition

At our or partners’s workshop it is possible:realize prototypes/turning woodturning steel/laser processingwater cutting/cast bronzes/carpentry

Workshop

In our center or at the teacher’slaboratories you have the opportunity tofollow courses based on experimentationand direct practice of various techniques.

ART GLASSPAINTINGPHOTOGRAPHYFRESCO TECNHIQUEICON TECNHIQUERESTORATIONPLASTER CASTING

Yearbook

As an archive of activities we publish a yearbookrepresentative of the various experiences hosted andproduced using photos and texts of artists and events.It is possible browse and buy the Yearbook on ourwebsite. Other Publications

The garden

View from the garden

Enjoy the beautiful landscape !

Duccio and Mimmaare waiting for you!