Melting Traces_panels by recall-project

MELTING TRACES Remembering the victims of “Operation Whale”, Rome 1944

The Quadraro Neighborhood The Quadraro neighborhood lies at the south-east corner of the city of Rome spreading along the district VIII of Tuscolano, near the Roman Acquaduct park, its origins dating back to year 1600. The name “Quadraro” was used since the 1930`s to describe the South -East area between Porta Furba and what today is Cinecitta. The place has a strong tie to agriculture as many of these areas were used as agricultural fields before its urbanization. Since its origins, and to the date, the neighborhood has had a marginal character; the first settlers were peasant families which migrated from southern Italy, and the initial settlement took place in a very spontaneous way, many of them being simple shacks attached to the walls of the former roman acquaduct. Although the neighborhood was consolidated originally around the area of the “Quadraro Vecchio” along the via Tuscolana, it has grown considerably in extent and population, spread up to the area of Cinecitta. Today the neighborhood has been absorved by the city and has a population of approximately 21,000 inhabitants1. The Quadraro Vecchio is a heterogeneous area. Physically it has grown due to social housing projects in the decades after the WWII, and nowadays historic buildings and ruins (like the Aquedotto Felice) coexist alongside small peasant houses, agricultural houses, fields, and the ubiquitous Roman fountains. A diversity of cultures and generations live here; immigration groups from China, Bangladesh Morocco, Peru, Romania... have settled in this part of the Italian capital. Next to them there are still “original” inhabitants who have lived in the neighbourhood their whole lives, people from different city areas that have moved in, students... The heterogeneity of this social lattice was a very important and determining issue when planning an intervention, since it had to speak to many different social and cultural backgrounds, in principle only joined together by the Quadraro itself.

Still today, there is a certain sense of identity among the population of the Quadraro (in their majority working class). Although the quarter is connected by many metro stations and through Via Tuscolana (there is a constant commuting flow to, and from, Rome), being “from the Quadraro” still means something specific and particular, slightly different from being a Roman.

1 www.wikipedia.it

A. Location of the Quadraro at the periphery of Rome B. Quadraro Vecchio within the expanded quarter C. Near the Aqueduct at Quadraro: Frame from “Mamma Roma” by Pier Paolo Pasolini.

The episode: Operation Whale or the Rastrellamento in the Quadraro

Image Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9XCGiu34Ds

After the Armistice of Cassibile signed between Italy and the allies (7th September 1943), Rome was declared “open city”. On the very same day, the Nazis attacked and occupied the city. There were many areas of detention and torture in Rome run by the Nazi-fascist regime. Fosse Adreatine and Forte Bravetta were two of the sites near Rome where mass killings were perpetrated. The neighbourhood known today as Quadraro Vecchio was a traditionally peasant- and working-class area of Rome. Many of its inhabitants came there as consequence of the renovations being carried by Mussolini in the centre of the city. The relocated citizens were mainly working class, sharing the quarter with peasants and immigrants from the South of Italy and Abruzzo. The quarter gained a reputation as a safe haven based on the self-organization of its inhabitants, despite having no political or institutional power. The civilians in the Quadraro reacted with many small and frequent acts against the Nazi-Fascist military regime. This was a reaction motivated by survival needs more than a political statement, but slowly they became unbearable for Nazi-Fascist power.

During the Nazi-Fascist occupation the Quadraro was known as a ‘nido di vespe’ or hornet’s nest, because of the difficulty that the German and Italian troops encountered when trying to keep it under control. The neighbourhood offered thus a certain amount of protection for anyone acting beyond the imposed legality at the time (during our field research a witness at the time said “even thieves felt safe in Quadraro”). Lieutenant Coroner Herbert Kappler planned what is known as “Operation Whale” (later to be commonly known as the Rastrellamento of the Quadraro) to take control of the neighbourhood, by imprisoning every man alive in the area. The military action began at dawn on April 17th 1944. The Germans surrounded the perimeter of the Quadraro, and slowly gathered prisoners at the Cinema Quadraro. Some of them managed to avoid being taken thanks to the priest Gioacchino Rey, who argued that some of them were too old or too young to work. Approximately 950 men between 16 and 60 years old were then taken from Cinema Quadraro to Cinecittà, in the vicinity of the quarter, and later deported to work in factories in different parts of Germany (as ‘Zwangsarbeiter’ [forced labour] or ‘Fremdarbeiter’ [foreign labour]). Just until recently war prisoners taken by the German troops during the WWII were not considered war victims. There is subsequently little documentation about ‘Zwangsarbeiter’ or ‘Fremdarbeiter’. Due to the hard conditions in the factories where they had to work (and in certain cases due to the allies’ bombings), many of them died in Germany or never managed to come back to Rome. After the deportation of the Ghetto, this is the largest deportation of Italian civilians to Germany documented during the WWII.

1. Settlements at Felice Acqueduct 2. Barracks around 1915 3. Partisan Resistance at Quadraro 4. Former Cinema Quadraro at the Via Tuscolana 5. Transit to Fossoli Deportation Camp

Image Sources: 1. http://levocidellacquedottofelice.wordpress.com/about/ 2. http://archiviofoto.unita.it/index.php?f2=recordid&cod=2815&codset=NAT&pagina=32#foto_3 3.http://www.articolotre.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Roma-Antifascista.jpg 4. Photo of poster taken by the Authors 5. http://www.circoloculturalemontesacro.it/finestreavvisi/cecafumo.htm

Objectives & Strategies There are many themes and ideas that crystallize around this site, and which we tried to integrate into our intervention. -Trying to work with an event like the Rastrellamento can’t be approached from a traditional memorialization because of its relatively small impact, specially when placed within a framework of such brutality and magnitude as WWII. Moreover, the story of the Rastrellamento isn’t the story of one man, but of a network of men, and of the confluence of their lives at a given point on a given place. It is a story told, in this particular example, by the Quadraro itself. The social network that kept the Nazis at bay had to be a part of the work, which is what lead us to think about an open air installation spread through the whole neighbourhood as a possible presentation form. -The memory of the Rastrellamento is fading rapidly; as we mentioned above, survivors are scarce and new generations don’t always show a personal interest in the story. We felt the intimacy of the story (being pulled out of your bed at dawn to be taken away), and the underlining of the multiple, personal stories was of particular importance to try and help the different backgrounds present in the neighbourhood relate to the story; its (in)humanity, as it were, was what we needed to convey. The sheer number (approx. 950) of men being taken away conveys more or less immediately what such a numerous absence must have meant to a relatively small community at the time. The loss of a beloved one and the act of grieving trespass cultural boundaries and are thus a powerful tool for us to help such a diverse community connect with the story. -The oral network in the Quadraro: -Absence: the story of the Rastrellamento is a story of removal, of uprooting. What we wanted to underline with our intervention was the creation of 1.000 (as a symbolic number) sudden ruptures in the social lattice of such a small, close community at the time.

VII

DCCCXC

-A local Industrial ice Factory will produce the 1000 transparent ice blocks. Inside each one of the pieces will be one of the objects collected. -Exact location of the pieces will be previously defined. Acoording to the story of the object and other artistic dessicions. -Due the duration of the production the ice blocks will have to be storage in order to have them all simultaneously ready for the installation day.

Quadraro Vecchio: A Network of Memories During the week of 8th September and 15th September, and having already made some previous research (available literature, internet, maps, etc.) we visited the Quadraro Vecchio area. Some interviews were made to locals, among them relatives of the victims of Rastrellamento and neighbours from different generations and communities living in the area. As far as the Rastrellamento goes, the memory of the event is fading rapidly. The institutionalized attempt towards memorialization, represented by a sculpture depicting a soldier trying to take a man and his wife trying to defend him, hasn’t really managed to keep the event alive, probably because it doesn’t really bear any relationship to the actual inhabitants, and in many ways, it doesn’t bear a relationship to the actual events (for example, why should the sculpture be in the park, that didn’t play any particular role in the event?). There is also no trace left of the Cinema Quadraro (torn down in the 50’s), and no hint of the role it played during. As a comparison, Amsterdam still retains small sculpture-like reminders of some of the places the Nazis chose to gather Jews and different groups. Nevertheless, there still remains a small and ageing social group that transmits the story orally, and that serves as the last possible direct connection between the population of the neighbourhood and the event. The few people there that still recall the events of 1944, though, find very little interest (if any, among the new neighbours) in their stories, since many of the original inhabitants and their descendants have moved out of the Quadraro. During our stay and research, we witnessed a rather flexible and fluent network of oral communication among different layers and locations of the quarter: for example, on our second day asking around about the Rastrellamento we found out a woman had already heard there was a group of young men making questions. This oral network seems to be (according to some neighbours at least), slowly fading away, partly because of the newer, much more diverse demographic composition of the quarter. This is very relevant to our image of the site, because it is probably that very same community spirit that turned it into such a resistant area against the Nazi regime, and the story of the Rastrellamento could perhaps play a role in taking concrete steps towards bringing back that idea of a community surrounding the quarter.

-On a 17th of April the pieces will be delivered at dawn (same day time more-less as the Operation Whale) in the Quadraro Veccio by a previously coordinated truck flotilla. -The trucks that deliver the cubes will have a Ritual and performative character. Team members (and possibly locals engaged collaborators) will be in charge of the right location of the pieces -Documentation of the pieces by video and photography

DCDII

DCCCXC

LXXV CMX

CM VII

XCIX

XCVIII

DCCVII

CCXXIV

DCCIX

CMLXXIX

CCCXV LXII

VXXIX LXVI

XVII

CCXXIV

LXIII LXIX

CDXLIII

XII

CCXXIV DCIXX

Selected Areas within Quadraro Vecchio to Locate 1000 Ice Cubes

The Project: Melting Traces We propose for the Quadraro an open-air installation with a clear temporal character (lasting approximately one day) that makes the process of disappearance tangible and so metaphorically re-enacts the Rastrellamento. On the night of the 16th of April, and until dawn on the 17th, 1000 ice blocks (50 x 50 x 24) will be placed along streets and sites over the neighbourhood (Via dell Aquedotto Felice, Via dei Quintili,Via Tuscolana, the market, etc.), spanning the whole of the Quadraro Vecchio. All through the day the ice blocks will slowly and inevitably melt (considering the average temperature in April in Rome, we have calculated the blocks would take slightly over a day to melt completely), erasing their own trace in a manner resembling memory processes. Because some of the blocks will be placed forming clusters or groups, and because all of them will be exposed to light and heat in different amounts and times, their homogeneity as objects will rapidly disappear, as they will all melt in different forms and speeds. allowing the piece to develop its own natural process, as happens in the stories that evolve in an organic way from the oral tradition. The installation thus creates a temporary presence, and materializes the process of disappearance that lies at the heart of the Rastrellamento; the experience of the installation breaks into the daily life of the Quadraro and recreates a sense of community for the time of its duration, since it is directed and experienced by all living in the quarter. The piece is a memorial for each of the anonymous men taken away at the time, and a visual representation of the labyrinth-like construction of social relationships in the quarter. The blocks will leave nothing but pools of water after them, that will be re-integrated into the neighbourhood, already dominated by the ubiquitous sound of fountains and the presence of the aqueduct. The project conveys the magnitude of the event by recreating its numerical aspect throughout the neighbourhood, while at the same time de-centralizing its structure to adapt to both the reality of the Quadraro and to be truthful to the memory of the event. Citizens are confronted with a relatively sudden event (an apparition, it could be said) that extends to the whole neighbourhood. The fact that the installation can never be seen completely from a single point of view stresses the idea of diversity, and the many perspectives on the event, underlining the idea that such an event was comprised of many individuals, and canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t be rightfully expressed by reducing them to a single symbolic entity.

Installation along Via Tuscolana

Typical Cross Section of the Installation