Orvieto, the Art and Faith festival is back: debut of the ‘Kantiere Kairos’ in the cathedral

After the pandemic, the Festival of Art and Faith is back in attendance, which this year has scheduled the national preview of the new album ‘Cantate Inni’ by Kantiere Kairos in an acoustic version. The event will be held on June 15 at 9 pm in the splendid setting of the Orvieto Cathedral. The scheduled event is the heart of this edition of the Festival, which aims to “enhance the relationship between art and faith” with the aim of “involving everyone, religious and lay, intellectuals and artists, believers and non-believers, citizens, foreigners and pilgrims, to celebrate a permanent jubilee in Orvieto on the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ “. From 20 to 26 June, at the expo hall of the Palazzo del Popolo it will be the turn of the exhibition by Thomas Lange and Mutsuo Hirano entitled ‘the raft of the medusa’.

The band The band Kantiere Kairòs, formed by Antonello Armieri (vocals and acoustic guitar), Davide Capitano (bass), Gabriele Di Nardo (drums and percussion) and Jo Di Nardo (guitars) was born in 2013. The choice of a name that means’ time of grace, a favorable moment ‘, is due to the fact that they feel like workers on a construction site, at work for their own conversion and for the proclamation of God’s love through music.

Festival of art and faith The International Festival of Art and Faith of Orvieto has hosted in recent years leading figures from the world of culture including: Angelo Branduardi, Roberto Vecchioni, Claudia Koll, Amedeo Minghi, Susanna Tamaro, Massimo Cacciari, Franco Nero, Giacomo Poretti, Paolo Cevoli, Giovanni Scifoni, Giulio Base and many other important scholars from the most prestigious universities in the world. The festival was organized in two weeks of meetings and testimonies with representatives of the varied world of culture and with contemporary masters of spirituality. Distinguished guests, music, shows, film previews and exhibitions. An ideal journey – from Pentecost to Corpus Domini – to be lived intensely, every year, as a time of preparation and renewal.

The stop for the pandemic The last two years, however, have also affected the programming of the Festival, organized for the past 16 years by the cultural association Iubilarte, in collaboration with the Municipality of Orvieto, the Diocese of Orvieto-Todi, the Chapter of the Cathedral and the Opera del Orvieto Cathedral. In 2020 the first lockdown forced a suspension of the festival. Last year, the first event was again in attendance, immediately after the second lockdown, with the presentation of the novel ‘Everything asks for salvation’ by Daniele Mencarelli, winner of the 2020 Strega Giovani Prize. Even in the face of this year’s persistent health emergency However, the organization was forced to ‘limit’ the ferment that animates the city for two weeks and immerses it in a lively atmosphere of celebration, choosing to propose a unique event in the 2022 edition of Arte e Fede. «This year, despite the difficulties in the planning and programming phase of the Festival – explains the artistic director, Alessandro Lardani – the chosen formula is that of a single major event of national caliber. The Festival will host in the Duomo the preview of the Cantate Inni tour by Kantiere Kairòs, one of the most interesting and original bands of the pop-rock panorama of Christian music in Italy. We plan to return to a full program of Arte Fede in 2023, starting from that legacy of beauty preserved in the collective memory and continuing the path undertaken in recent years. We want the Festival to remain a living experience of culture and spirituality embodied in time and space in the most significant places in Orvieto, a city-cathedral-stage that embraces everyone, the city on the mountain that cannot remain hidden ».

The raft of the medusa The famous painting by Théodore Géricault is the inspiration for the Raft of the Medusa exhibition. «The theme of the shipwreck – explain the authors – can be seen as a general theme of humanity and therefore as an indication of the current situation. The exhibition of paintings presents itself as a theatrical scenography of ‘disorder’ simulating the situation of the shipwreck as a symbol of human problems. Yet the poeticization of Disaster through art is a sign of hope ».

The exhibition The exhibition, sponsored by the Municipality of Orvieto, will be held from 20 to 26 June from 16 to 20, in the expo hall of the Palazzo del Popolo and will be preceded on Sunday 19 June at 17 by a vernissage. After the institutional greeting and the introduction by the President of the Municipal Council, Umberto Garbini, Inno alla Gioia will follow with the voices of Alessandro Picciolini and Thomas Lange, music by Gabriele Tardiolo and Roberto Forlini

The artists Born in Berlin in 1957, the artist Thomas Lange focuses his attention on the theme of time, on the comparison with the past and on the ultimate destination of man. At the end of the 1980s, his first work became part of the Würth Collection, one of the most important German private collections. Mutsuo Hirano was born in 1952 in Hyogo (Japan). In 1974 he graduated in Art from Tenri Daigaku University and the following year he moved to Germany in the Federal Republic of Germany. He studies German Language and Culture at Philipps-Universität Marburg, graduating in Art History in 1990; he also studies art at the Institute of Painting and Graphics in Marburg. He currently lives and works between Italy and Germany. As a sign of thanks to the Orvieto municipality, Thomas Lange and Mutsuo Hirano will donate two of their works to the city of Orvieto.

Orvieto, the Art and Faith festival is back: debut of the ‘Kantiere Kairos’ in the cathedral