I am going through a moment of introspection; I have been thinking about my childhood a lot and trying to figure out a bit of the madness of today. In doing so, I remembered about the great set designer, artist and animator Lele Luttazzi. When I was just 8, I was lucky enough to meet him at a stop motion workshop, in my home town in Italy. I remember creating a magpie made of paper cut outs coloured with pastels that we then animated, it was very basic animation obviously.
My favourite animation amongst his production is without any doubt the Academy Award nominated movie “Pulcinella”. What truly gets me about this piece is its clear anarchic and anti-authoritarian message. Pulcinella is pissing onto an equestrian monument and is therefore chased by the “Carabinieri”. Ultimately he manages to escape and goes back to pissing on the monument but this time flowers and colours are exploding form every corner. Today’s images of colonialist statues getting torn down echoes Pulcinella’s bravadoes my mind from far away.