On 17 November, 100 years after the birth of Franco Basaglia – the Italian psychiatrist who revolutionised the way mentally ill patients are perceived and treated – the Italian Cultural Institute of Ljubljana, in collaboration with GO!2025 and Accademia della Follia, presented the play ‘Quelli di Basaglia… a 180°’ by Antonella Carlucci and Angela Pianca.
Accademia della Follia (Academy of Madness) is a theatre project featuring actors labelled as being at risk, bearers of psychic, physical and social discomfort. The show talks about the words regained by those who have lived and live this experience, describing the way in which bewilderment, rebellion, loneliness, uncertainty, and hope made the impossible become possible.
On stage, the actors interpret a mosaic of texts, articles, interviews, poems, and authentic testimonies by Franco Basaglia, the Basagliani and the ‘madmen’. They interweave text with music, dance, and song, thus reinventing ways in which madness can finally return to be part of life and not be reduced to a mere illness.
Furthermore, on 18 November, an evening dedicated to Franco Basaglia was held at the City Museum of Ljubljana (Mestni muzej Ljubljana). Institutional greetings were followed by the screening of the film “Trieste racconta Basaglia”, introduced by director Erika Rossi. Angela Pianca, Basaglia’s collaborator and director of Accademia della Follia, Vito Flaker, associate professor at the University of Ljubljana, Alessandra Oretti, director of the Trieste Department of Mental Health, and Mario Colucci psychiatrist at the Trieste Department of Mental Health and lecturer at the Neuropsychology Specialisation Schools at the University of Trieste and at the Istituto per la Clinica dei Legami Sociali in Venice, took part in a panel discussion, moderated by Andreja Rafaelič, researcher at the Institute of Social Sciences in Ljubljana.
