La vita italiana

The 11th edition of the Los Angeles, Italia. Film, Fashion and Art Fest, held at the TCL Chinese Theatres, on the pre-Oscars week, from February 21 to 27, channeled its efforts in celebrating two Italian legends.   The first, Italian …

A century ago in Black Diamond, Wash., the freight trains arrived empty twice a day and twice a day they left, loaded with coal. Railroad assistant Amos Ungherini would go down the line each day in a hand-pumped “speeder” to …

In Italy, food means much more than nutrition, it is culture, heritage, tradition. Satisfying all senses at once in a voluptuous embrace, Italian food is impossible to resist. Its variety is legendary and its history rooted deep into that of …

On my first Easter in Rome in the Jubilee year of 2000, I joined the throngs jammed into the massive piazza of St. Peter’s basilica. Pope John Paul II, bent with age, extended Easter greetings in dozens of languages, including …

I was utterly charmed by Palermo when I was there less than a week ago. I admit to have been somewhat wary of it last time I visited. It was a combination of the bumper-to-bumper traffic; the accommodation (which although …

Lorenzo Soria’s parents were Jews, urged – by the suffocating climate following the “Italian Racial Laws” – to embark on a diaspora to Argentina. They settled down in Buenos Aires, where, in 1951, Lorenzo was born. The boy grew up …

I am referring to Leonardo da Vinci ’s portrait of Ginevra de’ Benci, his only painting to be found in the Western hemisphere. It is one of the greatest glories of the National Gallery in Washington D.C., and was purchased …

Towering 2,460 feet above Trapani on the Mediterranean Sea in northwest Sicily, the ancient citadel of Erice has found a new outlook by catering to the wedding trade. Today its 12th-century Norman castle serves as the backdrop for hundreds of …

When looking at a gondola, have you ever noticed that sinuous object supporting the gondolier’s oar? Well, neither had I, until I learned about it at the Venetian workshop of Piero Dri, one of only four remaining artisans in the …

Brilliant, versatile, spiritual, funny and generous. Franc D’Ambrosio, an artist with a thousand faces, hidden for over 2,600 performances behind the shadow of the most fascinating and obscure mask of the theater musical, The Phantom of the Opera. D’Ambrosio’s resume …