CENTRO INCONTRI UMANI – ASCONA 

Current schedule

2016

International Conference – Techniques of Spiritual Experience: West and East
27 – 29 May 2016

The purpose of this conference is to critically examine the mental and physical techniques performed by ascetics or mystics belonging to different religions, cultural areas, and historical periods. Concomitantly the conference seeks to discuss the spiritual experiences that are allegedly associated with these practices.

Varied techniques will be scrutinized, for example, Kabbalistic meditation and visualization methods, Heychastic prayer and breath control, Sufi dhikr, or Buddhist and Tantric dhyana and visualization practices. Account will be taken of the physical postures and activities (breathing techniques, movements and postures, dance, music, etc.) which often accompany the practices.

A Balinese shadow play will be performed at the Dimitri Teatro in the village Verscio in association with the conference. The puppeteer is a consecrated priest in his community.

Convened by: J.P Brach, A. Hobart and T. Zarcone.

conference programme

Workshop – Egalitarianism: Forms, Processes, Comparisons
8 – 15 March 2016

A workshop for researchers of the ERC-funded research project “Egalitarianism: Forms, Processes, Comparisons”, hosted by Prof. Angela Hobart (Centro Incontri Umani) and convened by Prof. Bruce Kapferer (University of Bergen)

The concept of Egalitarianism is extraordinarily broad, as is the no less nebulous ideal of equality, having virtually ontological value in modern Euro-American thought, increasingly so globally. While Egalitarianism is conventionally associated with Equality and its opposite Inequality, this project takes Egalitarianism as an expansive term including going beyond these relatively more reductive terms.

The project as a whole is lead by Prof. Kapferer and is hosted by the University of Bergen and has received funding from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement no. 340673

www.egalitarianism.no

draft programme

After the workshop by Prof. Angela Hobart

Workshop experience by Marina Gold, University of Zurich

Lecture – The Virgin of Cancuc and Subcomandante Marcos
8pm, 11 March 2016 – Sala Balint, Monte Verità, Ascona

As part of the ERC-funded research project “Egalitarianism: Forms, Processes, Comparisons”, Dr Alessandro Zagato (University of Bergen) will present ‘The Virgin of Cancuc and Subcomandante Marcos A parallelism between symbolic constructions in past and current indigenous rebellions in Chiapas’

There is free entry to the public.

The project has received funding from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement no. 340673

abstract and images

11 Settembre 2015:Paesaggi e Interiorità: un viaggio intermediale Concerto ‘son et lumière’. Ying Li e Curt Cacioppo.

2015

Building Bridges through Music – In The Search Of Light
23 – 25 October 2015

Seven accomplished musicians from diverse traditions will be working together as residential artists at the Centro Incontri Umani, Ascona, and will be playing separately in small events, before performing together for the public at Teatro Sociale, Bellinzona (23rd October) and Teatro Dimitri, Verscio (25th October) . There will be also one hour broadcast on radio DRS about the individual musicians and their meeting in Ascona.

The musicians are Sola Akingbola (Nigeria/UK – percussion), Sarah Lauret (France – Cello), Gaurav Mazumdar (India – sitar), Sardor Mirzakhojaev (Uzbekistan – dutar, rubab, tanbur), Kuntal Roy (India – tabla), Ngô Hông Quang (Vietnam – Dàn Nhi, Dan Bao), Helena Rüegg (Switzerland – Bandoneon)

The programme has benefitted from the kind support of the SüdKulturFonds, financed by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC).

Concerts:
Friday, 23 October 2015, 1:30 pm Teatro Sociale Bellinzona (educational project for the secondary school in Bellinzona)
Friday, 23 October 2015, 8:45 pm Teatro Sociale Bellinzona
Sunday, 25 October 2015, 6:00 pm Teatro/Fondazione Dimitri Verscio

11 Settembre 2015:Paesaggi e Interiorità: un viaggio intermediale Concerto ‘son et lumière’. Ying Li e Curt Cacioppo.

Venerdì 11 settembre – ore 20:30 Sala Gioia – Monte Verità – Ascona :
Esposizione di dipinti di paesaggi ticinesi con improvvisazioni musicali e video con musiche originali

details

5-10 September 2015: Understanding Gender Inequality Actions in the Pacific: Ethnographic Case-Studies & Policy Options. Organised by Dr Tony Crook & Prof. Angela Hobart

This workshop will bring together participants in an ethnographic pilot research project taking a new look at gender inequality in the Pacific. Project members include anthropologists, gender and development specialists, legal scholars and a film-maker who are conducting studies in all three regions of the Pacific – Melanesia (Fiji, PNG, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu), Micronesia (FSM, Kiribati, Marshall Islands and Palau) and Polynesia (Samoa and Tuvalu), alongside Pacific men and women’s involvements in globalisation mobility in certain fishing ports in the region. This workshop aims to both enrich our understanding of the social actions involved in gender inequality – discrimination, violence, exploitation, representation – and to inform appropriate and effective future policy actions.

The hope of the workshop is to understand the social relations and actions and changing value systems that enable and constrain gender inequality, through vernacular terms and local exegesis so as to capture, foreground and privilege Pacific people’s own analyses of incidents and issues. By drawing together, discussing and analysing the findings from across the region, and by drawing out significant points and working principles, the workshop hopes to reimagine how researchers and policy-makers can support local peoples in their own efforts to negotiate and resolve social issues in a home-grown manner. The workshop programme will involve opportunities for public participation and presentation.

Link to films relating to the workshop

http://ciu-ascona.org/a-eng/Activities/Actual.html#

Oisín nel Tír na nÓg

Oisín nel Tír na nÓg è l’echtra, o storia di avventure, più celebre che lo riguardi. Narra del suo incontro con una fata di nome Niamh, che innamoratasi di lui lo portò con sé nel Tír na nÓg (“terra dell’eterna giovinezza”, conosciuta anche come Tír Tairngire, ovverosia “terra della promessa”). Dalla loro unione nacquero un bambino, Oscar, destinato ad essere ricordato per le sue gesta, ed una bambina, Plor na mBan. Dopo tre anni, Oisín decise di tornare in Irlanda per visitare i suoi cari, ma Niamh lo avvertì che, benché gli anni trascorsi a Tír na nÓg fossero stati solo tre, quelli passati in Irlanda erano ormai trecento, e gli sarebbero piombati addosso non appena avesse toccato terra. Gli diede il proprio cavallo, Embarr, e gli fece promettere di non smontare di sella per nessuna ragione. Oisín promise, e ritornò nei suoi luoghi solo per trovare la casa di Fionn, presso la collina di Almu, abbandonata e completamente in rovina. Risolse così di ritornare a Tír na nÓg, ma lungo la strada, mentre cercava di aiutare un uomo a sollevare una pietra su un carro, le sue redini si spezzarono e cadde a terra, divenendo istantaneamente un vecchio canuto proprio come aveva predetto Niamh, mentre il cavallo tornò al galoppo a Tír na nÓg.

Yeats

Secondo una versione della leggenda, Oisín non morì dopo il repentino invecchiamento, ma insieme al suo compagno della Fianna Caílte mac Rónáin sopravvisse fino all’arrivo in Irlanda di San Patrizio, al quale avrebbe narrato le storie della Fianna.

A questa tradizione si ispirò William Butler Yeats per la sua poesia The Wanderings of Oisin.