TAORMINA, Sicily – The exhibition entitled "Palimpsests. The ancient theatre of Taormina: from history to myth" is scheduled to run from Wednesday to October 31 2023. It is a hybrid project, combining finds from the past and multimedia contributions that represent the iconic Taormina Theatre in Sicily from the time of the Grand Tour as a palimpsest of collective memory.

 The exhibition was conceived by the Parco Naxos Taormina Archaeological Park in collaboration with Electa. The project envisages the new layout and musealisation of the western versura, the western entrance to the cavea, which, from being a transit space, has now become a narrative container of all the phases in the life of the Ancient Theatre. From the transformations in Greek and Roman times to its repurposing in the 15^th century - the unique architectural and symbolic stratification of the space that, today as two thousand years ago, allowed access to the spectacles.

 On display are the most important inscriptions for understanding the millennial history of the theatre and some of the fragments of the monument's architectural decoration: precious marbles from the imperial age hitherto undervalued, restored for the occasion and included in a museum itinerary specially prepared by the curators, the archaeologists Gabriella Tigano, director of the Naxos Taormina Park, Maria Grazia Vanaria and Dario Barbera. The exhibition design is by architect Massimo Curzi.

 The discovery of the inscription of Paternus, an important epigraph believed to have been lost since the 19th century and with which scholars can revise previous hypotheses on the phase of the theatre's renovation in the 2nd century AD, was a surprise for scholars during the preparation of the exhibition. Inscriptions on the walls documenting the restoration and the opening of the Western Versura to visitors, from 1869 to the present day, were also discovered which act as evidence of the intense tourist attendance of the famous monument by Italians and foreigners.

 A single grand narrative that embraces the entire monument with some of the main stages of the modern myth of the Theatre of Taormina: from Goethe to the vedutists of the Grand Tour (Houel, Cassas) in the years of the birth of the picturesque and the sublime; from the romantic restoration by Viollet-le-Duc to the artificial paradises of Klimt and von Gloeden in the late 19th century; from the first advertising posters of the Fascist period, promoting Taormina as a tourist resort, to the contemporary shows (classical theatre, Ettore Romagnoli's productions and Duilio Cambellotti's costumes, the dances inspired by antiquity); and finally the Italian and international cinema of the 1960s.

 Works of art, voices and images superimposed and intertwined over time: a symbolic palimpsest that summarises the western culture of the last three centuries and is grafted onto the material palimpsest of the Theatre of Taormina represented by the western versura. 

 Information

 www.parconaxostaormina.com

 Opening hours: daily, 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.

 Ticket prices: full price 13.50 euros / reduced tickets 8.50 euros

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