Memory and remembrance linked to the symbolism of the tree, a hundred years ago as today. A volume, promoted by the Central Institute for Cataloging and Documentation and by the Italian Parks and Gardens Association (Apgi), ‘Natura aere perennius. Parks of Remembrance and places of memory‘, traces their history: from their establishment 100 years ago to commemorate the soldiers who fell during the First World War with the tree up to the present day. A book which, thanks also to over 500 images, travels through history and aims to make young people aware of the defense and care of trees and of Memory.
“A significant initiative that brings the idea of the tree closer to man, a living being that ideally unites us with those who are no longer there – he tells time.news the ambassador Ludovico Ortona, president of the Associazione Parchi e Giardini d’Italia – a value to be passed on to the new generations who, at times, do not even know of the existence of these parks. It is necessary to avoid abandoning them because they have a very important symbolic meaning: born one hundred years ago to remember the fallen of the Great War, with the tree the person who is no longer there is revived, then as now. A part of historical memory that must not be forgotten”.
Author of the volume, edited by Danilo Montanari, is Vincenzo Cazzato President of the Scientific Committee of the Italian Parks and Gardens Association and full professor of History of Architecture at the Faculty of Cultural Heritage of the University of Salento. “The idea for this volume was born on the occasion of the celebrations of the centenary of the Great War and its release coincides with the centenary of the establishment of the parks of Remembrance on November 26, 1922, commissioned by the then Undersecretary of Public Education Dario Lupi”, explains Cazzato to time.news. “The tree is the protagonist. Trees that take on another meaning from the spectral and apocalyptic landscape of war in cities: in the parks of remembrance a virtual body is given to names that have lost a body, in an identification between the soldier and the tree, whose sap it is the blood itself of the fallen”. In the volume there is no shortage of references to metamorphoses, from Ovid to Dante, from Ariosto to Tasso.
A phenomenon, that of the parks of Remembrance, which is not only national but worldwide. They are born in Germany, Canada, Australia. “We wanted to underline that the theme of remembrance of the fallen, the identification between the fallen and the tree is topical. In the volume – explains Vincenzo Cazzato – examples of parks from the Remembrance of the Second World War are also proposed up to the creations linked to tragedies more recent ones, from Nassirya to the collapse of the Morandi Bridge with the project of the park on the Polcevera in Genoa or the idea of a monument for life in the San Siro stadium to remember the dead of covid”.
Parks that have often been forgotten, sometimes transformed, and in some cases destroyed. “Many times those who frequent them do not know the history and meaning of these places, which were often the first public parks of small towns. It is a volume – the author points out – which wants to remember that memory which risks being lost and which intends to raise awareness, more generally, of the care of trees”. A particularly useful message for the new generations: “In addition to the book, we have produced a video for schools which serves to educate young people to respect the tree. The future belongs to them”.