The Embassy of the Czech Republic in Rome and the Czech Centre in Rome, in cooperation with the Eleutheria Foundation in Prague, are organising a Czech-Italian evening in the Sala della Protomoteca of the Campidoglio in Rome today, during which the book "Italians in the Bohemian Lands" will be presented. The new publishing project realised by Eleutheria with the collaboration of the Italian Embassy in Prague will be illustrated by the director emeritus of the Library of the Strahov Monastery in Prague, Gejza Sidlovsky, and the president of the Eleutheria Foundation, Francesco Augusto Razetto. During the course of the evening, which will be attended by numerous dignitaries including the Italian Ambassador to the Czech Republic Mauro Marsili, pieces of baroque music will also be performed by the trio consisting of Davide Pozzi (harpsichord), Laura Scipioni (baroque violin) and Jakub Kydlicek (flute).
The volume, published in Czech and Italian with the accompaniment of an extensive photographic apparatus, was edited by Francesco Augusto Razetto, Ottaviano Razetto, Flavio Mela and Genny Di Bert, with the aim of deepening the historical and artistic relations between Italy and the Czech Republic through the studies and testimonies of numerous specialists. The work, with an introduction by historian Franco Cardini, illustrates the first Italian contacts with the Bohemian lands in the 10th century, continuing to the present day under the sign of the friendship between the two countries, in what Marsili believes can be considered one of the first forms of cultural integration that Europe has experienced. From art to architecture, from music to literature, the book reveals how numerous tangible and intangible treasures of the Czech cultural landscape are directly connected with Italy thanks to the influx of architects, masons, stonemasons and masters of art in general, as well as men of letters, scientists and artists, who from the Peninsula wished to apply their skills in this European area. Within the book, a specific in-depth study is dedicated to the "Italian Congregation of Prague", founded in 1573 and active until 1947, whose historical memory is still tangible in the buildings of the Mannerist chapel of the Blessed Virgin Mary Assumed into Heaven, in the very central Karlova Street, and the former Italian Hospital of Mala Strana, today the seat of the Italian Institute of Culture.
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