Issue link: http://saihq.uberflip.com/i/177372
artistic creativity From left, SAI Honorary Member Nancy Van de Vate, Honorary Member Nadia Boulanger, and Sophia Gubaidulina. Three Lionesses A triptych of women musicians who emblematically represent the varied world of women composers of the XX and XXI centuries By Pinuccia Carrer L et us imagine a dividing line. We start with preconceived ideas, which are similar to Lego building blocks; some are yellow and some green, some are four blocks in one, with a window; all are catalogued and each one produces a boxed-in emotion, rather like the theory of the emotions of the monkeys that had been conditioned by Pavlov ... but on the other side of the dividing line hic sunt leones is the dark zone. And there are many who say 'I'm not interested in playing with blocks, and money is of no interest. I want to free the pure energy inside those ready-to-use little Lego blocks and touch the living material that is burning underneath.' Writing a piece of music or explaining an artistic expression today means exactly this: one must look over and beyond the dividing line and assume the risk of tracing another line as a frontier….. one should persevere in believing that it is possible to build a work or rather construct a meaningful building that can be understood by others, even if at the beginning there are only two others: it is essential that the work stand on its own feet and that behind it there is an idea ... " This is a quotation from an interview given by Luca Francesconi to Marilena Laterza (in il Manifesto, 1st October 2008) before the opening of the 52nd Biennale of Contemporary Music in Venice, Future Roots, in which the Artistic Director, Francesconi, expressed his opinions about cultural behavioural patterns and female creativity in the present and immediate past, covering a period of roughly sixty years hic sunt leaenae. With determination and often with elegant discretion, women confirm with their artistic activities that they go well beyond the predictable constructions built with Lego blocks LIONESSES continued on page 20 sai-national.org WINTER 2011 PAN PIPES 19