Milan, Montanelli's statue supplemented with the puppet of an Eritrean child

Still in the crosshairs is the statue of Indro Montanelli at the Porta Venezia gardens in Milan. This time the monument was the subject of an artistic intervention by Cristina Donati Meyer, a well-known street artist who is used to addressing the most pressing current issues with urban art interventions. Now it was Montanelli’s turn: Donati Meyer “integrated” the statue with the puppet of an Eritrean girl by posting an explanatory sign.

“The monument to Indro Montanelli,” writes Donati Meyer, “is thus complete. There was no need to color the statue; it was enough to add, on the old man’s lap, the 12-year-old Eritrean girl he abused as a colonialist and fascist soldier.” An intervention, in essence, not violent, nor animated by the intent to vandalize the statue, and similar to the positions of writer Igiaba Sciego and Finestre sull’Arte director Federico Giannini who, in recent days, have precisely proposed to integrate the memory of Indro Montanelli if it is just impossible to remove the statue.

“It was not my intention to deface the monument, on the contrary,” said Cristina Donati Meyer. “That statue played, after more than a decade, a fundamental role in rekindling a discussion and reflection, never done in Italy, on what the Italian invasion and colonization in Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia and Libya meant. Nerve gas on civilian populations, bombings, mass rape, massacres, enslavement of girls and young girls, child brides, bought by their families, theft of artistic and monumental property, resources and land. We should all be grateful to Montanelli and his monument, which, acting in some cases as a scapegoat, allowed Italian women and men to learn about and come to terms with a horrendous past: that of fascism’s colonial wars and aggressions.”

Cristina Donati Meyer’s action was then interrupted by the intervention of State Police officers: in order to place the puppet on the work, Cristina Donati Meyer in fact climbed over the barriers and fence placed to protect the work in an anti-vandal function.

Milan, Montanelli's statue supplemented with the puppet of an Eritrean child

Warning: the translation into English of the original Italian article was created using automatic tools. We undertake to review all articles, but we do not guarantee the total absence of inaccuracies in the translation due to the program. You can find the original by clicking on the ITA button. If you find any mistake,please contact us.