In the seaside village of Aci Trezza, Sicily, the Rodolico family's shipyard has been building boats since at least 1808. They use the ‘mezzo garbo’ construction technique, handed down orally. In 1960, the shipyard's golden age began. Salvatore Martino, aided by his sons and more than thirty workers, began building large 40-ton wooden boats, applying a modification of his own invention to the hull, to insert a third engine underboard. MisterTuri represents the old tradition, which with its ingenuity manages to revive the country's economy. In 2018, it was recognised as a Living Human Treasure. His construction techniques include the use of the ‘dart of Jupiter’. The importance of its work, and of its ancestors, was recognised by the inclusion in 2014 of their ‘trezzote wooden boats’ in the REIS of the Sicilian Region. The decorations on the wooden boats are typical of traditional Sicilian ship carpentry. The motivations for decorating the hulls are to be found in superstitions, which elevate the boat to the status of a living being. The aim of the research is to safeguard these intangible assets, with field research involving videos, interviews and photos to form a digital archive. The study compares literary works, paintings, engravings, videos, interviews, archive documents, bibliography: to trace a continuity over time in support of the oral transmission of the technique of building wooden boats typical of Aci Trezza. It constitutes the intangible cultural heritage of a community.

Authors:
Grazia Nicotra, Università di Catania, Italy

About the Presenter(s)
Grazia Nicotra,art historian and illustrator, PhD student in Science for Cultural Heritage and Production,University of Catania, focuses on Material and Intangible Heritage.My doctoral research focuses on Sicilian shipwrights.

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https://www.linkedin.com/in/grazia-nicotra-79553916a/

Additional website of interest
https://www.disum.unict.it/dottorandi/grazia.nicotra

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