Local free-lancer expresses passion for Venice
At one time, one of the most powerful cities in the world, Venice, Italy is a crumbling, dilapidated ghost of its former self.
That was the message Friday night as free-lance author Ona Siporin taught that Venice’s once-beautiful architecture is turning into the ruins of Venice almost overnight.
She told the listeners, many of whom were middle-aged and older, about the intent of a group of Venetians who formed “The Spontaneous Committee for the Defense of Venice.” Siporin’s research about this organization and their findings and goals become the basis of an article called “Guarding the Stones of Venice,” printed in the October 2000 issue of the magazine “World and I.”
“[The Committee’s] interest is in what they call the ‘street furniture,'” Siporin said, who is the assistant editor of the Western Historical Quarterly. “[These are] stones, fountains, glass saints, bridgework, the shoreline along the canals.”
Siporin said most of the deterioration has taken place in the last 30 years, and the causes are both man-made and natural.
The older residents of the city, which has declined by 40,000 people since 1960, said they can remember a time when the stones and statues looked well-kept and “when the canals were clean,” Siporin said.
Venice is older than Egyptian cities Cairo and Alexandria and more intact than Kyoto and Beijing, said Siporin. Built on water, Venice became home for people starting in the first century A.D.
Siporin said one of the reasons there is such an uproar over change in Venice is due to the city’s long, stable history. Recently, it has become such a tourist attraction that Venetians cannot afford to live there. President of the Friends of the Utah State University Libraries Blythe Alstrom said he met a gondola guide who worked in Venice but could no longer afford to live there. He had to buy a home away from the city. This story is not unique; the population of Venice fell to 60,000 in 1999.
Along with the high cost of living, many of the large stones, called masegni, that line the walkways and streets of Venice, are being mysteriously taken and sold. They are worth $500 to $700 each. Siporin said when citizens try to pursue the reasons why the stones are being removed and sold, they are met with cold silence.
“They run up against the wall of ‘don’t touch it,'” Siporin said.
Also, acid rain is ruining the architecture of Venice, and there has been much water damage just in the last three years, said Siporin.
Siporin’s husband Steve, who lived in Italy for a year in 1978, agreed.
“A lot of the great works of art are being affected by acid rain,” Steve said.
The few active members of the Spontaneous Committee for the Defense of Venice have written articles, taken photographs and donated money to get the word out and to help preserve the city.
“They love Venice with a love that is unlike what I can express,” Siporin said.
Siporin doesn’t see Venice’s problems with a defeatist attitude, but she admits that the population decline is damaging because the more that outsiders come to live in Venice, the fewer people there are that care about preserving history.
“[Venice] has got real serious problems now because it’s lacking Venetians,” Siporin said.
The presentation, which included maps of Venice and Italy and photos of the disintegrated relics, lasted over an hour.
Linda Wolcott, vice provost over the library, is excited to hold speeches by authors.
“We started last year,” Wolcott said of the lectures. “We usually try to do one every other month.”
On Jan. 17, 2003, Ron Shook, associate professor in English, will give a presentation about racing in the Bonneville Salt Flats.
Siporin and her husband Steve, who teaches folklore at USU, lived in Italy in 1978. They also lived in Tuscany in 1999 and 2000, and Ona, who is fluent in Italian, helped teach a course and translate in the summer of 2002.
Alstrom introduced Siporin to the audience in the Merrill Library lobby.
“It’s a support group for the library,” Alstrom said of the Friends, which has been sponsoring speakers for over a year now.
Members of the Friends, of which there are about 300, become members by contributing money and books to the library. Some donations are so valuable the donor is automatically made a member.
-marklaroc@cc.usu.edu