Made In Italy: CGIL 100

by Enrico Ghezzi, Tobias Jones, Massimo Berruti (Photographer)

Italy's largest and greatest trade union, the CGIL, was formed in 1906, epitomizing what the fledgling nation's culture and credos were to represent in the twentieth century. At the time, the CGIL was able to encapsulate a traditional working class, the inevitable bourgeoisie, capitalists, and, later, fervent communists. Now, almost 100 years later, Italy has changed fundamentally. The demographic differences so starkly apparent at the time of the CGIL's formation have simply faded away, like a vibrant watercolor exposed to the sun. They have been replaced by a colorless chain-store homogeneity, a vagueness of purpose, a flatulent middle class without values or value. Made in Italy CGIL 100 investigates these shifts via pictures from four young photographers, Emiliano Mancuso, Mario Spada, Massimo Berruti, and Giancarlo Ceraudo. It asks the inevitable How can this have happened? Is anybody paying attention?

240 pages, Hardcover

First published June 1, 2006

About the author

Born in Lovere (Bergamo) in 1952, Enrico Ghezzi entered RAI, the Italian public service television company, in 1978 and was made responsible for film programming on RAI3. He offered cinema lovers a number of unusual and carefully chosen film cycles, such as "The dark mirror", "Eccentric visions", "Crazy women", "The magnificent obsession", "Colour black and white" and "Cinema of '68", many accompanied by on-screen commentary. Author of a well received book on Stanley Kubrik, he tried his hand at directing himself in 1987, shooting the 7-minute short "Gelosi e tranquilli" (Jealous and calm), part of a film in episodes directed by fifteen of the so-called "New Italian School" directors.
In 1988 he created, and still often presents, "Fuori orario" (After Hours), a late-night programme on RAI3, which shows things "never before seen" from the archives of TV broadcasters all over the world, offering sub-titled scenes from rare films and extreme examples from the international cinema culture. He achieved notoriety with "Blob", a programme created by Marco Giusti, which has been one of RAI3's most popular programmes since 1989. "Blob" introduced a new kind of TV programme, pulling apart and laying bare the communicative techniques of the television medium, creating a sophisticated intellectual linguistic game.