Lights and music at Torre Velasca


Tower to light up in blue starting today

Milan, December 10, 2015 PRESS RELEASE

Space Velasca – open to the city for free – will now house a multimedia story on the Tower.

Torre Velasca, the property of the Unipol Group since 2012, once again becomes the protagonist of Milan and its future.

During the Christmas holiday season, the Unipol Group will continue the enhancement of Torre Velasca started with Opening Velasca, a project that brought the Tower back to being a vital place of culture in Milan during Expo 2015.

Starting today until April, Torre Velasca will once again be the protagonist with Lights and Music at Torre Velasca, a project of high cultural value under the patronage of the Municipality of Milan and sponsored by various industry associations – including Confcommercio – and partner companies.

Lights and Music at Torre Velasca develops outside and inside the Tower with two sections: a light installation – which involves the central facade of the Tower and the square in front – and a multimedia installation within the exhibition space – Space Velasca – with the creation of a fascinating and evocative scenography that reproduces the history of the Tower using crossfading images.

“Today, we are inaugurating this interesting Christmas initiative of the Unipol Group under the patronage of the Municipality of Milan,” said the city Councillor for trade and production activities Franco D’Alfonso, “which goes along with the work to enhance Torre Velasca than began during Expo 2015. Thanks to the play of light outside and the multimedia installation inside, the inhabitants of Milan and the tourists will have another chance to rediscover and admire one of the town’s landmarks”.

Lights and Music at Torre Velasca

The Exterior
Starting today until April, projections of lighting effects and drawings will light up the two corner buttresses and the top of the front entrance to the Tower. The rectangular glass placed over the main entrance of the Tower, the ground in front of the main entrance and the ceiling of the entrance will also be illuminated. Light games are on daily from 5.30pm to 3am for the Christmas time, until 6 January and from 7 January to 20 April they are performed daily from 5.30pm to 12am.

The Interior. . Multimedia and light installation in Space Velasca. On the ground floor, other images reproducing in real time what is happening inside will be projected on the outer surface covering the windows of the entrance to Space Velasca. In this way the people walking in the square will be able to get a glimpse of what is going on in the interior. The scenic installation in Space Velasca includes a sequence of screens in the shape of sails, on which images that create an original visual journey are projected. These videos will create striking appearances on the sails, diversifications and new perspectives, a kind of kaleidoscope enveloping the viewer. The projections will be made with video-projectors and theatre projectors. Suggestions telling the history of the Tower and the social and cultural context of the period in which it was built (the decade 1950-1959) will be flowing by inside Space Velasca. Visitors will be able to watch the architectural story of the Tower with historical images of the building that outline the originality of the project and bring out its importance in the town’s architectural landscape, where it integrates and communicates with other monumental buildings. The images will in particular linger on the buttresses of the Tower. They are a distinguishing mark of the building and underpin its architectural design. The society of that historical period (1950-1959) will also be represented through a series of images regarding fashion, advertising and celebrities that made that period unique. Those were the years of the golden decade of Maria Callas at La Scala, and the period when the style of Italian- Milanese high fashion was entrusted to the famous fashion designer Biki. Those were the years in which Milan became a point of reference for national and international fashion The history of the Tower will also be told through the history of design and the most significant graphic and pictorial art of the 50s with magazine pictures and graphic works, design objects of architects, such as Gregotti and Albini, and works of artists, such as Accardi, Afro, Capogrossi, Dorazio, Fontana, Turcato, and Vedova. All of these personalities led to profound changes and formal revolutions in that period. Then there will also be frames from a few films shot in Milan and that used Torre Velasca as their setting, such as Il Vedovo (The Widower) by Dino Risi, and Milano Calibro 9 (Caliber 9) by Fernando Di Leo. Space Velasca will thus stand as a scenic space with a strong emotional impact, becoming a unique space for major musical performances and other cultural events. Space Velasca is open Mon-Fri from 5pm to 9pm and is free of charge until the april 20th 2016 (It is closed on holidays and pre-holidays). .

The illustrations have been taken from publications and documents of the (Milan) Public Libraries and private archives. The project is curated by the set designer and director Sebastiano Romano, an artist who has worked in major Italian theatres, such as the Arena in Verona, and curated numerous shows and cultural festivals, and by Studio Comunicazione & Immagine of Mariella Di Rao, which specializes in the creation, organization and communication of cultural projects and scenic lighting of buildings and urban areas.

Torre Velasca is part of Urban Up, the real estate redevelopment project of the Unipol Group aiming at enhancing some of the most important buildings in Milan that belong to the Group..

Contacts
Unipol Group Press Office
Fernando Vacarini
pressoffice@unipol.it
Tel. +39 051-5077705
Claudia Galassi
claudia.galassi@unipol.it
Tel.+39 02-51815268

Unipol Gruppo Finanziario S.p.a.
www.unipol.it