Palazzo Blu has organised an exhibition dedicated to Pisa and the Ventennio, entitled "Images from the Ventennio. Pisa and the Fascist Regime (1922-1943)" with the conception and scientific direction of Prof. Daniele Menozzi, and the curatorship of Dr. Giovanni Cavagnini, open to the public from 22 October to 26 March 2023.
In 2021, the Pisa Foundation purchased from the Allegrini family several thousand photographs (prints, films, plates) that Guido, for the most part personally, had taken between the mid-1920s and the 1940s, images, often of excellent technical quality, of incredible vivacity and interest, that represent an extraordinary document of the life and history of those years. A century after the beginning of the fascist regime, an exhibition conceived by Daniele Menozzi, and curated by Giovanni Cavagnini, entitled 'Immagini dal Ventennio. Pisa and the Fascist Regime (1922-1943)' presents Guido's photos that, together with some others from public or private archives, show, sometimes allusive, symbolic and even curious or ironic, the events, personalities and customs of the time.
The exhibition itinerary, supported by a rich didactic apparatus, proposes aspects and moments in the life of the city and its inhabitants following a precise narrative, chronological and thematic thread: the march and the conquest of power, the Conciliazione, the institutions of the Regime, Ethiopia and Spain, the Axis and the racial laws, the defeat and the ruins, but also the royal family settled for long months in San Rossore; the regime's hierarchs (the philosopher Gentile, the undersecretary of the Interior Guido Buffarini Guidi, the ministers Bottai and Ciano) and great entrepreneurs (Count Marzotto) active locally. An extraordinary array of images, the vast majority of which are from Pisa and therefore closely linked to the real life of the city, but which also recount the national and international events of those years, allowing the visitor, through the careful selection of photographs, to grasp significant aspects of the local reality that are representative of an entire era.
Photographic and documentary material from the Allegrini, Frassi and Salvestroni archives owned by the Pisa Foundation, and also from other archives of institutions and private collectors.
"Images from the Ventennio. Pisa and the Fascist Regime (1922-1943)' is also the title of the volume accompanying the exhibition, with contributions by Prof. Daniele Menozzi, Dr. Giovanni Cavagnini editor of the publication, Prof. Fabrizio Amore Bianco, Prof. Marco Giorno Bevilacqua, Prof. Andrea Mariuzzo, Prof. Paolo Nello and Prof. Christian Satto, published by ETS.
