The Museo Novecento will play host to the third edition of Firenze RiVista, a festival celebrating locally published magazines and free presses, from September 22 to 24. Part of the still-going-strong Estate Fiorentina, the theme this round is “Ricerca,” with a number of initiatives aimed at highlighting Florence as a center of cultural vitality and exchange. This year’s participating publications are The Florentine, 404: file not found, A few words, Con.tempo, Florence is You, FUL, L’Eco del Nulla, Lungarno, Riot Van, Three Faces and Toc toc Firenze.
Events kick off outside the main venue with a low-key pre-launch party at Libreria Café La Cité (September 21, 8pm), which will include a presentation of Gianni Tetti’s new book Grande Nudo, moderated by Salvatore Cherchi. Organizers and festival guests will be present at the evening.
Day 1 at the Museo Novecento gets going with a language-centered discussion on the project “Parole O_Stili“, given by Vera Gheno and Bruno Mastroianni and exploring online behavior patterns in everything from trolling to texting (9am, September 22). The afternoon will feature a public meeting of local magazines and publishing houses, as well as “Tell Me Something I Don’t Know,” a closed editorial pitch session in which aspiring authors can meet publishers at Effequ, CasaSirio and Racconti (2-3.30pm; booking required; info@firenzerivista.it). Later, literary magazines, including The Florentine Literary Review, TF’s bilingual journal of contemporary Italian poetry and short stories, as well as Effe, CrapulaClub, L’indiscreto and Three Faces, will take the stage (4.30pm).
Cinema also figures in to this year’s interdisciplinary edition, with an independent film workshop scheduled for September 24 (11am) and a September 23 talk titled “Gli orizzonti del cinema italiano” given by Edoardo De Angelis, director of Indivisibili, and Sydney Sibilia, director of Smetto quando voglio (5.30pm).
Additional highlights will include the Saturday night open-mic reading session in the museum’s cloister (September 23, 9pm), and a Sunday morning discussion of Islam in the contemporary city, led by Izzedin Elzir, imam of the Florence mosque, in the company of journalist Francesca Borri of Internazionale (10am, September 24).
Artistic director of Estate Fiorentina Tommaso Sacchi explained why Firenze Rivista is part of the larger festival: “Estate Fiorentina is a home for artistic dialogues and contemporary cultural production, and so the theme of publishing, with its complex industry, could not be left out. At a time when magazines face constant metamorphosis, due in large part to the advent of digital media, one can’t ignore the need to reinvent and explore the meaning and new role of quality print publications.”
Events are in Italian unless expressly noted otherwise. For the full program, see the website.
