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Texts by Alessandro Napoli
fratellinapoli@hotmail.com
Antica Bottega del Puparo - Via Reitano 55, 95121, Catania
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The Marionette Company Fratelli Napoli
The Marionettistica dei Fratelli Napoli represents the most significant reality of the traditional Catanese-style puppet theater. Founded in Catania in 1921 by Gaetano Napoli, it has now reached its fourth generation without any interruption in activity. All members of the family take part in staging the shows, each according to the role most suited to them among those typical of the Catanese Opira. For a century now, the company has carried out an intense theatrical activity that has led it to perform all over the world. In 1978, the Napoli brothers received the prestigious Praemium Erasmianum from the Royal Family of the Netherlands, which “crowns people and institutions who, through their activities, have enriched European culture.”
The Workshop
The Opera of the Puppets
The ancient Workshop of the Napoli brothers is located in the historic center of Catania, at no. 55 via Reitano, near the Ursino Castle and the historic Fish Market. It represents a heritage of great historical and cultural importance for the area, because, from the time of Gaetano Napoli to today, the "knowledge of the hand" and the craft rules that allow the creation of all the artistic handicraft objects linked to the tradition of the Catanese Opera dei Pupi have been handed down from generation to generation here.
The Opera dei pupi siciliani is a particular type of puppet theater that became established in southern Italy and especially in Sicily between the second half of the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century. The Sicilian puppets are distinguished from other puppets essentially by their peculiar operating mechanism and by their repertoire, made up almost entirely of chivalric tales derived largely from novels and poems of the Carolingian cycle.
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In 2008, UNESCO inscribed the Opera dei Pupi among the oral and intangible heritage of humanity.
The Museo e Teatro dei Pupi dei Fratelli Napoli is one of the main recommended attractions on Tripadvisor in Catania and Sicily.
In 1958, at the Universal Expo in Brussels, Napoli achieved their first success at the international level
In 1978, the Napoli brothers received the prestigious Praemium Erasmianum, which “crowns people and institutions that have enriched European culture”