Photo by Marco Ventimiglia
The Art Monastery Project is a community of artists dedicated to applying the disciplined, contemplative, sustainable monastic way of living to the creative process.
The brainchild of American artists Betsy McCall and Christopher Fülling, the Project intends to transform a historic Italian monastery into an international arts production center. Committed to investigating the idea of “social sculpture,” the Art Monastery Project develops a wide variety of performance-based and visual art in a way that focuses on the process of creation as much as the final products.
Particularly concerned with connecting historic tradition and contemporary life, the Art Monastery focuses on site-specific installations and performances as well as collaboration with the local community. Work developed at the Art Monastery premieres locally before touring internationally.
In 2010, the Art Monastery Project found an ideal location in the monastery San Antonio in the medieval hill town of Labro, 70 minutes north east of Rome. The building dates back to the 17th century when it was a Franciscan monastery and now hosts the artists of the Art Monastery Project, top notch hotel Colle di Costa, and the much celebrated Ristorante Ulisse.
It is a radical contemporary experiment in social sculpture inspired by tradition: to apply the disciplined, contemplative, and sustainable monastic way of living to the creative process. Email us at info@artmonastery.org or call (+39) 333 153 7353 for more information or to get involved. Learn more…
Provide a donation to the Art Monastery in the form of a financial contribution or material (office equipment, furniture, art, etc.). This is a powerful way to turn the dream into reality. Donations can be made through Paypal (to donazioni@artmonastery.org or click the button below). For tax-deductible donations, please donate through our fiscal sponsor, Fractured Atlas.
COLLE DI COSTA — Beginning in April 2010, the Art Monastery Project makes its home in this beautifully restored medieval monastery and hotel. After years of meticulous restoration, the convent, which had been reduced to the outer walls only with the ravages of time, is a fully functioning, historic yet modern center where the cultural and community life of a small medieval monastery or town can be recreated.
Colle di Costa boasts simple, elegant guest rooms, each with private bath, exhibition spaces, a 150 seat theater for concerts or conventions, hidden spaces perfect for wine and food tastings, and a comfortable bar/lounge area. Guests may also take advantage of the residency of the Art Monastery, choosing to study with one of the artists or taking in a performance. 
It’s a perfect location for the Art Monastery to realize its vision of an artistic community inside a monastery, animating the historic space with international performance, music and art, and of course workshops open to the public.
The collaboration with Colle di Costa is possible because of the visionary thinking of Colle di Costa Executive Director Giuseppe Pileri and Mayor Gastone Curini. The collaboration allows the Art Monastery to become not only an art production house but a real retreat from the world. In sum, the collaboration between Colle di Costa and the Art Monastery Project promises to create art and inspiration for years to come, in a luxurious location rich in history and Italian atmosphere.
A jewel-like medieval town perched on top of a hill, Labro is minutes away from Lago di Piediluco and features the still-inhabited Vitelleschi castle. Colle di Costa, likewise, is a modern hotel situated in an exquisitely restored, former Franciscan monastery with original cloister and state-of-the-art theater. ”A history of isolation has preserved a wealth of great culture and art, ready to indulge visitors without hesitation, but preserving the roots of its past.” The Art Monastery Project anticipates a fruitful relationship for many years to come at our new home in Labro.
As a member of the Collaborators Circle of Gli Amici dell’Art Monastery, you will connect with and support a group of international artists, musicians, performers and visionaries. By joining the circle, you will receive a number of artistically inspired benefits. To learn more, click here.
Actively demonstrate your leadership in supporting the arts by joining the Donors Circle of Gli Amici dell’Art Monastery. As a founding member, you will stand out as a major sponsor of the project, its programming, and its greater vision. To learn more, contact donations@artmonastery.org.
Provide a donation to the Art Monastery in the form of a financial contribution or material (office equipment, furniture, art, etc.). This is a powerful way to turn the dream into reality. Donations can be made through Paypal (to donations@artmonastery.org or click the button below). For tax-deductible donations, please donate through our fiscal sponsor, Fractured Atlas.
If you have materials you would like to donate, please look at our Wish List and send us an email.
There are three types of performance projects the Art Monastery is producing:
1. Major theatre, music, and/or dance spectacles for international touring. Your site could be the place where it is developed and debuted or a site for a second performance.
2. Site-specific performances developed specifically for your site and interacting with local artists and community members.
3. Smaller concerts or performances of one-five Art Monastery artists when they are available. [See bio list for artists.]
Finally, it is also possible to host “The Art Monastery” for a period of time (from two weeks to a season), In this case, the Art Monastery artists and staff would live in your community and develop one or more of these projects, creating a festival of works in your site(s). Booking: julia@artmonastery.org.
La Clausura Sconfinata interweaves baroque music, Gregorian chant and modern dance in an innovative yet classic new show exploring the interplay between freedom and enclosure. The music and choreography of this interdisciplinary work explore the paradoxical inner richness of life within the cloister. Throughout the hour-long piece, the all-female cast of twelve musicians and dancers work together with one artistic voice to express the isolation, pain, joy, community, and discipline of the extraordinary women who live within the cloister. La Clausura premiered as the main event of Narni’s Corsa all’Anello Festival on April 25th, 2009. The sold-out show was greeted with a standing ovation. According to York University professor and expert on renaissance convent life Helen Hunt, the performance “continues to resonate.”
Personale: Julia Pond, Lori Belilove, Candace Smith, Beth Disharoon
Canticum Canticorum musically presents The Song of Songs as set by Early Baroque composers, and incorporates Middle Eastern instruments and dance. We have chosen the most expressive and passionate works from the period, 1583 to 1635, including the music of Palestrina, Monteverdi, Grandi and Schütz. Careful arrangement of the vocals move the narrative and character development forward. Our staging of the Song begins outside the palace walls when a beautiful young Woman rushes to bid her Lover farewell before joining King Solomon’s legendary harem that very morning. Once inside, she shares her dreams and fears for her love affair, arranges secret trysts, and recounts harrowing night visits searching the city for her love. The costumes and choreography—drawing on belly dance and Baroque gesture—combine to bring to life the overwhelming sensuality of an ancient Middle Eastern harem.
A new multidisciplinary piece that brings Dante Alighieri’s inner self and personal struggles to life through a combination of electronic and live music, theater, and dance. Artists like American poet Ezra Pound, and Argentinian poet Jorge Luis Borges, who were both deeply influenced by Dante, and the contemporary experience of the performers themselves also shape the piece. The score, composed by Phoebe Jevtovic and Nathan Rosquist, references the medieval music of Dante’s time while using a modern structure and contemporary technology. Creator, theater director and actor Germano Rubbi contributes his interpretation of the three artists Dante, Pound and Borges, while choreographer and dancer Julia Pond embodies the concepts he struggled with and loved.
Inspired by Bocaccio’s famous scenario, this multimedia installation is constructed to fit each space where it is presented.
When swine flu spread inexorably through the population leaving death in its wake, ten artists flee the chaotic streets of the city, locking themselves away in the country in a space which they call the Oekolos. Every night, they entertain each other with ten short performances telling stories of love, success and the evils of the age. But one thing is never mentioned: the intense outside reality of riots, starvation, disease and war that will probably kill them all. They don’t strive for a manifesto or a political message. They speak plainly of their world… one that may be gone forever.
Decamerone presents ten short performances each day featuring music, dance, poetry, theater and installation art, all presented within a contemporary catastrophe scenario: the crash of the capital markets. As they enter the space, audiences are welcomed by the artists into an alternate reality. With art installations forming its functional interior and transforming the space into an integrated decor, the Oekolos actively relates the space, the performers and the audience to each other. The audience witnesses the performances from within this alternate reality.
Whereas the Oekolos represents a shelter from disaster that is greater than most individuals can fathom, it is also a meeting place for people from different walks of life and culture. Boccaccio’s original Decamarone (1351), a framestory about the plague in medieval Florence, heralded a new era in Western Europe through its collection of critical and satirical stories told to us by ten young people who painted a lively picture of their world. This festival version of the Decamarone gives a powerful context for a diverse collection of short performances and sets up a stage for contemporary voices to speak.
Personale: Marije Nie, Regia. Rita Marcotulli, Direttore Musicale
An evening of itinerant site specific performance that animates every corner of a town with music, dance, and visual art. Different themes can be chosen based on the time of year or space where the Labirinto is presented. In Calvi for the summer of 2009, the theme “Summer Temptation” was interpreted in various ways, which came together in an exciting combination of dream, comedy, and pure music. Every scene is designed to be short but captivating, providing a pure experience at each moment, and calling the audience to find, as in a real Labyrinth, the right path.
Personale: Germano Rubbi (Regia) Christopher Fülling (Direttore Musicale)
PDF.
Our dear friends Jim Stewart & John Zderic visited us last week in the former monastery Colle di Costa in Labro and wrote this lovely blog about their experience in Italy. Check out their photo gallery at http://web.me.com/jimrstewart/Site/Italia.html. Thanks Jim & John!!
Ciao Amici!
We’re just back from our trip. To say it was great time would be the understatement of our lifetimes.
We are in love with the village of Labro, the site of the Art Monastery Project and home to our many of our new friends. Labro is an excellent place to spend a few days and from which to make day trips to the beautiful villages in Umbira or Lazio. The Art Monastery is an exciting project managed by some of the most talented, energetic and friendly people on the planet. We had a taste of their efforts on our first night (go ahead, ask us anything you want about castrate, the humors of the body or the sexy side of singing courtisans!). The lodgings at the monastery are provided by Colle di Costa and are in one of the most striking renovated monasteries you could imagine. 
Best of all is the attached restaurant (Ristorante Pizzeria Ulisse) where each meal was a masterpiece. Visit these places soon before they are over-booked: www.artmonastery.org; info@colledicosta.it and 0746.636295 for Ristorante Ulisse.
We bookend-ed our visit to the countryside by a few days in Rome. The Hotel San Anselmo (www.aventinohotels.com) was the perfect place to escape the craziness of central Rome (even though it was just a few short blocks from the sights). Book this hotel via Tablet Hotels for the best deals (www.tablethotels.com).
Everywhere we went the food and wine was excellent, the people friendly and helpful and it was warm and sunny. Did we mention the food & wine??!!!
For a little peek at our travels, visit our new site: http://web.me.com/jimrstewart/Site/Italia.html
We can’t wait to return and if you’re interested in making a trip to Italy we have plenty of good stories and more recommendations.
Addio!
Jim & John
Click to read:
Api: festa nazionale a Labro dal 2 al 5 settembre
Labro (Rieti), 17 mag. – (Adnkronos) – Si terra’ nel borgo medievale di Labro, arroccato su una collina nella provincia di Rieti, la festa nazionale di Alleanza per l’Italia, in programma dal 2 al 5 settembre con il titolo ‘Alleanza per il futuro’. L’evento e’ stato illustrato oggi dal presidente del movimento Francesco Rutelli che ha sottolineato il carattere simbolico della ‘location’: “Labro si trova -ha ricordato- nel centro geografico d’Italia, anche se sappiamo che sull’argomento Rieti ‘duella’ con Foligno per aggiudicarsi il titolo”. “Il momento in cui il paese si divide, qui vediamo ancora il cuore sano e vivo del paese in un borgo incantato che ispira una sensibilita’ importante in un momento di lacerazione del Paese”, ha aggiunto. Il programma prevede quattro appuntamenti quotidiani, con un autorevole speaker che prendera’ la parola al mattino, con un intervento particolarmente mirato sui giovani, mentre nel primo pomeriggio tocchera’ agli ospiti politici e successivamente e’ previsto un incontro con delle personalita’ di rilievo nazionale. Concludera’ ogni serata uno spettacolo, di cui si e’ gia’ avuto sentore in questo ‘sopralluogo’, che ha visto la visita del leader di Api accompagnata, tra le mura medievali della rocca che si affaccia sul lago di Piediluco, dalle note di un singer americano, di nome Charles, dell’associazione Art monastery project, fra gli esponenti artistici che popolano la numerosa colonia straniera di Labro.
(Fan/Zn/Adnkronos)
Last but not least:
We performed a vespers in the church in Labro, then the audience came to the monastery and had aperitivi in the courtyard while our musicians jammed. We then led them into theater, where co-founders Christopher & Betsy made a brief introduction to the Project, showed a video of what we’ve done the past, the mayor and few other dignitaries spoke, and we gave a sampling of the marvelous talents of the team: everything from strait-jacket escape accompanied by Shakespeare in Italian to an aerialist accompanied by live Hildegarde.
May 22nd, Click to expand
Between the courses at Cena Art Monastica (Art Monastic Dinner), we performed English madrigals, Gregorian chant, and jazz. Loads of people came, had a great time, and everyone seems to love us! We are inundated with invitations to perform at local festivals and private parties. There were two glowing substantial articles with photos in Rieti newspapers and, as a result, more people want to see a sampling of our talents again!
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Not in Italy but still want to go to an Art Monastery event?
A Benefit for Molly Freedenberg and the Art Monastery Project
Thursday, May 20, 2010
8pm-2am, $5-$50 donation
Bollyhood
3372 19th St, San Francisco, CA
www.bollyhoodcafe.com
www.mollytheism.wordpress.com
Summary: Mischievous monks and unconventional nuns are invited to a night of art, music, performance, and irreverence to benefit Molly Freedenberg’s upcoming stay on an art monastery in Italy. Performances include live bluesy rock by Wally Cutthroat Duo, funktastic beats by DJ , live painting by Nicole Schach, blasphemous burlesque, and sultry surprises. Costumes encouraged.
Background: The Art Monastery Project, the brainchild of two San Francisco artists and their community, is transforming an old Italian monastery into an international arts production house. Now in its fourth year, the project seeks to join artists and creatives with a variety of expertise and experience to apply the disciplined, contemplative, sustainable monastic way of living to the creative process.
Molly has been invited to join this year’s residents to share and explore a variety of talents and interests, including event production, choreography, dance/movement, writing, singing, and piano. Her (ambitious, but not impossible) goal is to raise at least $1000 by June 1, and $2000 by the end of the summer.
For more info, contact Molly at missmollydiane@gmail.com or (805) 216-6550, or visit her blog about this process at www.mollytheism.wordpress.com.
And finally, Molly’s SECOND event:
May 27th at Bollyhood in SF
8pm-2am,
$10 suggested donation,
dance, live music!
Stay tuned to www.mollytheism.wordpress.com to learn about this AND next week’s benefit!
Among the artmonks-in-residence in Labro this summer are Andrew Pulkrabek, a fantastic bassist & beatboxer, and Naomi Hummel, a fabulous dancer & aerialist. They’ll be sharing their adventures over at their new blog. Read their first post here:
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Hello friends! We have survived our first week at the Art Monastery, and boy, has it been an adventure.
Where to start…
First, our home. We had seen a few pictures prior to our arrival, but nothing could have prepared us for this. We are out in the middle of beautiful nowhere in the mountain village of Labro, which was founded around 900 AD and strongly resembles Minas Tirith from the Lord of the Rings movies. We live across the valley from this medieval wonderland in the Colle di Costa, a 14th-century monastery that has been partially converted into a hotel. Most of the original structure and adjacent church have been preserved, and the contemporary additions give the place a very cool feel. The modern additions include conference rooms, a restaurant and a small theater that has housed most of our creative endeavors. It’s so quiet that the neighborhood birds form a thunderous morning chorus, and the view from the belltower is breathtaking.
Our days begin at 8:00 AM with a chilly jog across the valley to Labro, where Naomi leads the assembled Artmonks in a rigorous physical training regimen. Such things are far less common in Italy and the locals who have wandered by regard us with a mixture of confusion and amusement. We then retire to the hotel restaurant for breakfast, which in Italy means coffee, juice, cake and six kinds of cookies. Not just tea biscuits, mind you, but cookies specifically designed and advertised for breakfast consumption. Needless to say, this is a little challenging for a health-conscious vegetarian/gluten intolerant pair like ourselves, but we’ve found some delicious ways around this little hitch. Lunch is at 1:00, followed by individual training and projects until dinner at 8:00. After dinner we gather in the monastery’s church to do a compline service, a twenty-minute segment of Gregorian chant and meditation that winds us down at the close of the day. The rest of our schedule will be in flux for the rest of the summer, but here’s a brief overview of our recent activities
For the last week we have spent our mornings doing a Gregorian chant intensive and are now in full-on Artmonk mode. Our instructor is a jolly old Belgian man named Eugeen (pronounced OY-gen), who we simply refer to as “The Boss.” He has been studying Gregorian chant for over twenty years and is a very knowledgeable (albeit demanding) authority on this esoteric subject. Despite the fact that this music is sung in unison over a range of less than an octave, it turns out that Gregorian chant is very hard to do. It is even harder to learn, as it is written using an archaic notation system that implies no meter and delineates a variety of almost-imperceptibly different dynamics and articulations using one of about twenty kinds of squiggles. Virtually every rule has multiple contextual exceptions, melody lines change without notation or textual warning and most melodies must be constantly modified to fit lyrics which never repeat and are written independently from the actual music. Did we mention that this is all done in Latin?
We’ve also done several performances for the folks of Labro, including a grand debut/presentation of the Art Monastery Project to the community. Andrew melted faces with beatboxing, jazz and a straitjacket escape, while Naomi blew Italian minds with a smoking aerial silks act and several sultry vocal numbers.
We’ve done several Gregorian chant performances this weekend. One was performed with an actual Bishop (!) in the beautiful town of Orvieto. If you are not aware (We weren’t), Orvieto is the home of a beautiful cathedral, the Duomo, that was built to house the bloody altar cloth miracle thingie of Corpus Christie (something something Christian important something…) and has a stunningly ornate exterior. We didn’t go inside cause it cost three Euros. But we strolled around the lovely, if very touristy town, tried four different flavors of gelato, and threw a paper airplane off a cliff.
This next week brings us an experimental music project in which we will start to pull apart our chant work and reassemble it to produce a number of new pieces. With luck we’ll have some recordings to play for you shortly, so stay posted!
Ciao!
~Naomi & Andrew
We moved into a monastery! Now we live in Labro! Here’s our blog about it.
Beginning in April 2010, the Art Monastery Project makes its home in this beautifully restored medieval monastery and hotel. After years of meticulous restoration, the convent, which had been reduced to the outer walls only with the ravages of time, is a fully functioning, historic yet modern center where the cultural and community life of a small medieval monastery or town can be recreated. Colle di Costa boasts simple, elegant guest rooms, each with private bath, exhibition spaces, a jewel-like 150 seat theater for concerts or conventions, hidden spaces perfect for wine and food tastings, and a comfortable bar/lounge area. Guests may also take advantage of the residency of the Art Monastery, choosing to study with one of the artists or taking in a performance.
It’s a perfect location for the Art Monastery to realize its vision of an artistic community inside a monastery, animating the historic space with international performance, music and art, and of course workshops open to the public.
The collaboration with Colle di Costa allows the Art Monastery to become not only an art production house but a real retreat from the world. In sum, the collaboration between Colle di Costa and the Art Monastery Project promises to create art and inspiration for years to come, in a luxurious location rich in history and Italian atmosphere.
