Nativity scenes (presepe) are a big deal here. Lots of churches, shops, civic centres have large ones for passers-by to stop off and coo over, and there's no shortage of shops and stalls supplying the ingredients for people to make them at home too. In addition to the tradition wood and cork-constructed stable and clay characters, we've also seen some more elaborate and expensive scenes available to help you keep up with i Jonesi, involving waterfalls, mountains, lakes and shooting stars.
We saw particularly special one at Pistoia cathedral yesterday: c.4m x 2m in size, encompassing what could only have been the entire Nazarene council district, and made from discarded nut shells.
The other church visitors admiring the presepe delle noce seemed disapproving of my taking photos, but more fool them for not carrying a camera with which capture the scene.
Given the lack of background information, I hestitate to speculate on how Franco Milani conceived the idea, but he must really really like nuts.
1 comment:
well impressed by the nut nativity, though it looks a little like Nativity scene as imagined by second generation settlers to mars.
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