ITALIAN JOURNEY – PROGRAMME 2

VENICE – LIVIO DE MARCHI

Thanks to Venice’s rich cultural heritage and the money spent by the millions of tourists who visit Venice each year, almost every street has fabulous shops selling the work of Venetian artists and craftspeople.  You can buy antique glass, golden masks, luxury fabrics, and contemporary art.

And, for a taste of the unusual, Livio de Marchi makes a wooden overcoat.

Livio de Marchi: Here we are! 

Gabriella: How amazing! Everything’s made of wood! It doesn’t look like it, I can’t believe it’s all wood.

Livio de Marchi: Yes, it’s all wood.  Wood is a material that gives us energy, get-up-and-go, we need wood.

Gabriella: What gave you the idea of creating things from wood?  When did you begin?

Livio de Marchi: It’s difficult to say when I began.  I remember I used to play with wood when I was a child.  I used to make toys from wood, I used to carve pieces of wood before they were put in the fire, when I was young.  So I created these dreams of mine with wood.

Gabriella: Do you know what’s funny?  I look around at the things here, for example.  I can see trousers standing up on their own, the coloured brushes I saw before, a bear over there.  They are all things that remind you of toys.  Is it a way of staying young?

Livio de Marchi: It’s a blessing for us, for you to be able to be like children sometimes.  Because it can help us get through many things.  We have lots of energy when we are very young, and this brings us happiness.  I change completely sometimes.  And I believe that when I take my hat off and put it on in the evening, tired after a day’s work, I believe that it turns into wood, and when I put it on in the morning it turns back into a real hat.

Gabriella: What kind of relationship do you have with Venice, your birthplace? I mean would this work be conceivable elsewhere?

Livio de Marchi: I’ve never thought about it.  I was born in Venice.  My parents are Venetian.  I want to die in Venice because it’s a good place to be, we can … I am still discovering things in streets that I’ve never seen.  Venice is a marvellous city.  How could I not love it and want to live here?

Livio offers to show us another one of his creations, something bigger, that he keeps elsewhere in Venice.

Gabriella: An open-air car-park.

Livio de Marchi: Open-air. We are, well, look...

Gabriella: But it’s amazing! Fabulous!

Livio de Marchi: This is my car, you might say, because it is a car.

Gabriella: All made of wood?

Livio de Marchi: All made of wood. Look! At this! Can you see? And I use different types of wood - this is walnut, this is maple.

Gabriella: And you mix them together.

Livio de Marchi: I liked this a lot.  I made it because it is already a work of art.  Yes, that light – like that.  It’s good fun.

Gabriella: And you leave it its natural colour?

Livio de Marchi: Always. I never colour wood… Yes, it’s beautiful.  I like it.

Gabriella: Do these go round?

Livio de Marchi: I told you, the car works. Yes, look, this works.

Gabriella: What do you mean, it works? So it’s a moving sculpture?

Livio de Marchi: It’s a car!

Gabriella: What do you mean, a car? It’s a model!

Livio de Marchi: Made of wood of course, but it’s a car!  It’s got an engine. 

Gabriella: A real engine?

Livio de Marchi: Yes, a real engine, so you can travel in it.  Will you come with me?  On a trip?

Gabriella: I’ll come, but you drive, because I wouldn’t dare drive it.

Livio de Marchi: OK, I’ll drive.  But it’s such fun, that it works.  It has an engine, everything, see?  Shall we go then?

Gabriella: OK. Let’s go.

Livio de Marchi: Here we go.