Italia Nostra, dismay over Agrigento telamon project

“Bewilderment”: the Sicilian section of Italia Nostra does not mince words in referring to the project to rebuild and raise the telamon of the Valley of the Temples Archaeological Park in Agrigento. It is one of the telamons of the majestic temple of Zeus Olympius, the Olympeion. built in thanksgiving to celebrate the victory at Himera of the people of Agrigento over the Carthaginians, in 480-479 B.C., at the behest of the tyrant Theron. The project, dubbed “musealization,” was presented in the presence of all the authorities of the region: Sicilian Regional President Renato Schifani, Regional Councillor for Cultural Heritage and Sicilian Identity Francesco Paolo Scarpinato, Valley of the Temples Archaeological and Landscape Park Director Roberto Sciarratta, Agrigento Mayor Francesco Micciché, Agrigento Prefect Filippo Romano, the curator of the musealization project arch. Carmelo Bennardo and the project’s scientific expert arch. Alessandro Carlino.

The project came after a long and problematic journey of studies, research and restoration, lasting 20 years, which led to the lifting of the calcarenite telamon, about eight meters high: the set of blocks is now standing, supported by a twelve-meter vertical steel structure to which several brackets are anchored, useful for supporting the individual pieces of the recomposed artifact.

“Inside the metal box that contains it,” says Leandro Janni, president of the Sicilian section of Italia Nostra, “the ancient telamon appears suspended. Decontextualized. And this image, inevitably, arouses in us the memory of the scattered fragments of the temple of Zeus in the sublime Valley, when the landscape was memory, harmony between nature and history. So, we cannot hide our surprise, our bewilderment at such a result.”

Architect Alessandro Carlino, following the objections, said that “It is a temporary display as if it were a showcase; and then it is a reversible project.” However, points out Leandro Janni of Italia Nostra, "This is not the first time that singular display experiments have been carried out within the Archaeological and Landscape Park of the Valley of the Temples in Agrigento. I recall, in 2011, the placement of the large bronze sculpture Icarus Fallen by Igor Mitoraj: very close to the temple of Concordia, it appears as an improper irruption with no historical connection to the context. Moreover, we cannot fail to mention that even the late Sebastiano Tusa, in 2018, in his capacity as regional councillor for cultural heritage, authorized an invasive and cacophonous contemporary art exhibition in Agrigento’s Valley of the Temples: the Jan Fabre, Ecstasy & Oracles exhibition."

According to Italia Nostra, “some, starting with its directors, believe that the admirable vestiges of Agrigento’s Valley of the Temples Park and the superb, lush landscape overlooking the Mediterranean Sea are not enough to attract tourists and visitors from all over the world. And so they resort to such ’prosthetic displays’ that, in our opinion, add nothing to the sublime, extraordinary beauty of the Park. If anything, they shatter and offend it, inexorably. But the times we are going through and the protagonists on the scene these are.”

Italia Nostra, dismay over Agrigento telamon project

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