“Sant’Anna di Stazzema – Il Silenzio”: exhibition by Serafino Beconi, lest we forget

The inauguration of the exhibition “Sant’Anna di Stazzema – Il Silenzio”, by the Versilian painter Serafino Beconi will be held at Palazzo Ducale, Thursday 31 July at 19.00.

2014 is an important year for the remembrance of Sant’Anna di Stazzema. 70 years since the massacre, 20 years since the opening of the cabinet of shame, 10 years since the start of the process. The Provincial Authorities of Lucca and the Banca del Monte di Lucca Foundation, in collaboration with Stazzema Town Council, have chosen to commemorate the tragic event with an exhibition: lest we forget, to construct a future of peace.

This unconventional exhibition interprets the three days responsible for changing the history of sant’Anna and the Versilia area. 11 August, the day before, life in the quiet of the Apuan mountains, seemingly protected from the atrocities of the war. 12 August, the arrival of the soldiers, the mothers’ desperation, the children’s cries, the massacre, an incomprehensible retaliation with indescribable cruelty. In just a few hours, 560 civilians, mostly women, children and the elderly, were slaughtered. 13 August, silence. In Sant’Anna all is quiet: only the voice of death and desperation can be heard in a silence which followed for decades. There are signs of hope within the overriding desolation: the few surviving children; a hope that was revealed 50 years later in the documents of the rediscovered Cabinet of Shame and, finally, the start of the trial. A hope and a memory that became a project in the setting up of a Park of Peace in Sant’Anna.

The exhibition features a selection of works from the series dedicated to the massacre by Serafino Beconi, the artist who died in 1997 and who, between 1959 and 1964, dedicated himself almost exclusively to the remembrance of Sant’Anna di Stazzema, “incapable or unable – as he said himself – to dedicate himself to anything else”, that seemed trivial or vain in comparison to such a tragedy.(Press release)

Entrance to the exhibition is free and it runs from 1 August to 1 September, from 17.00 to 23.00, and from Tuesday 2 to Sunday 21 September, from 15.00 to 19.00. Guided tours run every 30 minutes. Closed Mondays. Visits outside of opening hours are available by request for groups and schools.