Institutional portal - Municipality of Milan

RACHELE BIANCHI
Artist, sculptor, deeply Milanese in all expressions of her creativity, Rachele Bianchi has been one of the protagonists of contemporary plastic art in recent decades. Born in Milan in 1925, after rigorous classical studies, she began at a very young age by trying her hand at drawing and sculpture with the first exhibitions at the Angelicum Institute. Her notoriety came in the 2011s with works such as "The Wedding at Cana" and the series dedicated to Kafka. In those same years you opened your first solo exhibition at the Zunino gallery. This is followed by a series of primary exhibitions throughout the country: Turin, Brescia, Cosenza, Venice, in which Rachele Bianchi's works interact with large public spaces: basilicas, libraries, art galleries, squares. In XNUMX the work "La donna di Calabria" was placed in Piazza Parrasio in Cosenza. In the same year there were three personal exhibitions in Valletta and Gozo in Malta which were followed, in the following year, by a personal exhibition at the Italian Cultural Institute in Athens. Winner of numerous art awards, Rachele Bianchi has interpreted the creativity of Milan, testifying to a deep and constant love for her city and raising its artistic prestige in Italy and Europe.

GILLO DORFLES
Artist, critic, historian, intellectual of the first magnitude, Gillo Dorfles innovated the language and methods of art criticism by breaking down the barriers that separated artistic genres, connecting the historical avant-gardes to mass tastes and always maintaining a free, young and unscrupulous. An acute observer of society and history, he has always retained the pleasure of equal and free dialogue with young people. Gillo Dorfles was born in Trieste where he completed his classical studies. Having moved to Milan in 1928 and graduated in Medicine with a specialization in Psychiatry, he has been involved in art criticism since the 1948s. Professor of Aesthetics in various Italian universities, he founded the Movement for Concrete Art in 1952 together with Gianni Monnet, Bruno Munari and Anastasio Soldati. During the 1955s he organized numerous exhibitions with members of the MAC, in Italy and Europe. Memorable were the traveling exhibition in Chile and Argentina in 1956 and the exhibition "Experiments in synthesis of the arts" in XNUMX at the Galleria del Fiore in Milan. In XNUMX he was among the founders of the Association for industrial design. In the following decades he dedicated himself intensely to a vast and multifaceted critical production, proposing innovative connections between art, sociological investigation and communication. Winner of awards such as the Compasso d'Oro of the Association for Industrial Design (ADI), the Gold Medal of the Triennale, and the Franklin J. Matchette Prize for Aesthetics, and was awarded the Gold Medal of Civic Merit of the City of Milan, the Grifo d'Oro of Genoa and the San Giusto d'Oro of Trieste. Gillo Dorfles brought prestige to Milan in the world by spreading the Ambrosian spirit of creativity, freedom and love for innovation.

INGE FELTRINELLI
“Books are life, books are everything”: this is the phrase by Inge Schönthal Feltrinelli chosen by the city of Milan to commemorate her in the City Council the day after her death on 20 September 2018. A woman of exceptional human temperament and extraordinary culture , Inge Feltrinelli dedicated her life to Milan and Europe, bringing to Italy the novels and essays of the best international culture between the two centuries. She is responsible for the Italian diffusion of authors and artists such as Ernest Hemingway, Allen Ginsberg, Nadine Gordimer, Pablo Picasso or Marc Chagall. Born in Germany in 1930, after embarking on a journalistic career in Hamburg, she was in New York as a photojournalist: her shots told Europe about the cultural life of the Big Apple more than a thousand articles. In 1960 she moved to Milan with her husband Giangiacomo and made it the center of her editorial activity but also the setting for her inspiration. She managed the Feltrinelli publishing house with foresight and an innovative spirit, honoring the great Milanese publishing industry. Among her most significant undertakings is the new headquarters of the Feltrinelli Foundation, an architectural icon of the new Milan and a cultural center for readers of all origins and ages. Inge Feltrinelli linked her name to that of Milan, conquering the international public and elevating the cultural offer of our city with an unparalleled contribution of style and love for culture. 

MARIO CERVI
Master of journalism, style and humanity, Mario Cervi is a symbol of the best Milanese and Italian journalism. Since 1946 he has reported on Milan from his post as a reporter at the Corriere della Sera, reporting on the most diverse aspects of city life with exemplary clarity. Sent abroad, he followed live events such as the Suez crisis and the colonels' coup in Greece. In 1973 he was one of three Italian journalists who followed General Pinochet's coup live. In 1974 he founded Il Giornale with Indro Montanelli, of whom he has always declared himself a student and with whom he wrote the famous Storia d'Italia series. In 1994 he created, together with Montanelli, the new newspaper La Voce. In his last years of work he continued to write for Resto del Carlino, La Nazione and for Il Giornale of which he accepted the honorary editorship. Essayist, historian, rigorous intellectual, tireless seeker of facts, events and keys to interpretation at the service of the reader, he has honored the Ambrosian journalistic tradition by offering the city an example of intellectual honesty, coherence and generosity.

MARIA CHIARA PERINI
Journalist, writer and screenwriter, Maria Chiara Perini was one of the protagonists of Italian comics. Born in Milan in 1950, she began working in 1968 as a translator for Edizioni Corno, quickly becoming a screenwriter and then editorial coordinator of magazines such as Spider-Man, Fantastic Four and Alan Ford. After creating the first Italian periodical dedicated to horror: Il Corriere della fear, in 1978 Maria Chiara Perini became editorial director for the Rizzoli group, relaunching Il Corriere dei Piccoli and the monthly Snoopy. Generous and far-sighted in promoting young emerging cartoonists such as Bonvi, Magnus, Pino Zac, Maria Chiara Perini, she created and made dozens of characters known: superheroes, secret agents. With her talent she has dealt with in depth even complex works such as The Betrothed or themes such as the Gulf War. She is a pioneer and forerunner of the new, she has best interpreted the innovative soul of Milan. 

ANTONIO IOSA
Born in the province of Foggia, but lived in Milan for most of his life, Antonio Iosa was a leading figure in the city's cultural, social and political life. Animator of an important season of civic commitment in the Milanese district of Quarto Oggiaro, he was founder and president of the Perini cultural club. The Club, thanks above all to the tireless and passionate work of Iosa, has become an active instrument of social cohesion and a garrison of multicultural dialogue and democratic discussion in the area. Having fallen victim in 1980 to an attack by members of the Red Brigades, he continued, despite the physical and psychological trauma he suffered, to work with dedication to the affirmation of the values ​​of dialogue, tolerance and non-violence, dedicating particular attention to the promotion of memory and legality among young people and in schools. In 2002, Milan awarded Antonio Iosa the Ambrogino d'Oro and today, with his inscription to the Famedio, he remembers his exemplary commitment carried out with generosity throughout his life in the service of the city community.

PAOLA CHIARA MAROZZI BONZI
Educator and family consultant, in 1984 she founded the Life Help Center in the Mangiagalli Clinic, directing it for over 30 years with the mission of offering support to maternity with help projects, listening paths, concrete tools to support mothers. Originally from Mantua, Milanese by adoption, she began her professional career as an elementary teacher, dedicating herself above all to children with mental retardation. With the foundation of the Mangiagalli Life Help Center you have concretized your passionate idea of ​​protecting life and maternity with unparalleled civil and moral impetus. She offered help to women facing an unexpected or unwanted pregnancy, offering them listening and support in making a free choice not dictated by economic need. She won the Gold Award for Civic Merit from the Municipality of Milan in 2003 and has carried out an intense activity of information and meetings with entities active in supporting maternity. In 2017, at the invitation of the Orthodox and Christian Church of Moscow, you organized a conference in Russia on listening to women in difficulty due to pregnancy. Courageous, tenacious, passionate supporter of life, Paola Chiara Marozzi Bonzi has brought prestige to the city of Milan through an undisputed empathetic and professional strength, defending women's freedom of choice in all circumstances.

FREE CROSS
Libero Traversa, born and raised by a family of staunch anti-fascists, chose to go underground at the age of fourteen to fight the dictatorship and the German occupier. Having joined, under the nom de guerre Aiace, a detachment of the Rosselli Justice and Freedom Brigade, he took part in the Resistance until the Liberation. After the war he continued active political militancy by joining the communist party. This passion for politics accompanied him throughout his life, leading him to participate in the events of the groups born following the dissolution of the PCI. Active within local institutions, he held the position of provincial councilor in the seventies and was a member of the provincial committee of the ANPI, becoming honorary president of the 25 Aprile Section. Libero also dedicated himself to the journalistic profession, taking on roles in various newspapers linked to political and trade union movements. His life is a concrete testimony of love for freedom and democracy. An example of passionate and generous political commitment within those democratic institutions that he himself contributed to affirming and building from a young age. The Municipality of Milan, after having awarded him the highest city honor in 2007, remembers his figure by inscribing his name in the famedio among the most illustrious Milanese.

MARIA GRAZIA PERINI
Born in Milan, Maria Grazia Perini was a writer, journalist and screenwriter. She began working in the publishing world at a very young age, collaborating with the editorial staff of Selezione Donna of the Reader's Digest Selezione group. Since then she has undertaken a rich and diversified career which has seen her hold management and responsibility positions at numerous newspapers and publishing houses: she has directed Corriere dei Piccoli, Snoopy, Quattrozampe, Eureka and coordinated all the Marvel publications published by Editoriale Corno . Passionate about science fiction, fantasy and horror, she has made an important contribution to the diffusion of these genres in Italy by creating comic book series such as Shang-Chi, Dracula and Il Corriere della Paura. The passion with which she supported the growth and affirmation of Italian comics made her a true example and model for many journalists, authors and illustrators in our country. Awarded several times for her work, she obtained the prize from the National Association of Friends of Comics in 1975 and the Ravello prize in 1989. Milan remembers her great sensitivity, professionalism and commitment to promoting comics as a form of communication and artistic expression. 

LUIGI DADDA
Rector of the Polytechnic of Milan for twelve years, from 1972 to 1984, Knight Grand Cross of the Italian Republic, Luigi Dadda was a pioneer of computer science in Italy and around the world. In 1954, after graduating in electrical engineering, he requested the assignment of a digital electronic calculator for his institute, the Polytechnic of Milan. The rector Gino Cassinis sent him to California to collaborate on the creation of the CRC 102A machine which was installed in September of the same year, making Milan the first city in Europe to be equipped with a computer. Having become full professor of electrical engineering in 1960, he coordinated fundamental research on computing systems, microcomputers, data languages ​​and computer networks, leading computer sciences to make decisive progress, which is still the foundation of the most complex data processing architectures today. In 2016 he was awarded the prestigious "Mileston Award" by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, the world professional association of electronic engineers: the only Italians to receive it before him were Alessandro Volta, Guglielmo Marconi and Enrico Fermi. Luigi Dadda brought prestige to the Milan of science and technological progress throughout the world, interpreting with enthusiasm, generosity and passion the highest Ambrosian values ​​of trust in research and human progress and openness to the world.

GIANCARLO GARBELLI
Born in Sant'Angelo Lodigiano in 1931, Giancarlo Garbelli was a middleweight and welterweight boxing champion and an international boxer. Son of an artist, with a frail appearance to the point of being nicknamed "el ranin" (tadpole), he grew up amid the difficulties of the war and upon his father's death in 1945, he dedicated himself to emulating his sporting exploits while carrying out various jobs to support himself. After one hundred and twenty matches as an amateur he turned professional in 1952. He achieved 72 victories out of 98 matches and ended his career in 1963 without suffering knockdowns or KOs. In the United States he earned the nickname "Fighter of Italy" thanks to his courage and tenacity. Among his most important fights are the one with Duilio Loi for the Italian title, lost on points in 1955, and the challenge to the European champion László Papp in 1960, which ended in a draw. After leaving the ring he dedicated himself to numerous entrepreneurial and artistic activities, also acting as an actor for cinema and advertising. In 2015 he was awarded the honorary "World Champion WBC" belt for being one of the greatest Italian boxers of all time. His life and his successes are the mirror of Ambrosian stubbornness and dedication, of that tenacity that has brought Milan from the post-war period to today at the top of the international scene.

ANTONIO VIRGILIO SAVONA
Born in Palermo in 1919 and moved to Rome at a very young age, Antonio Virgilio Savona showed a strong interest in music from a young age which he educated and refined by studying the piano at the Santa Cecilia conservatory. He stood out for his improvisational skills and his strong interest in jazz despite that musical genre being opposed by the dictatorship. He participated in the lively musical scene of the capital and, having come into contact with other young musicians, gave life to the Cetra quartet during the war years. The quartet, of which his wife, Lucia Mannucci, also joined, was characterized by an original style close to jazz and swing, but open to the influences of other musical genres, from the most innovative ones to popular and traditional music: the ability of elegantly combining song and show gave Savona and the Cetra quartet an extraordinary success with the public even outside national borders. Antonio Virgilio Savona spent a large part of his life in Milan and the city remembers his talent, refinement and sense of entertainment with which he contributed to tracing some memorable pages in the history of music and entertainment in our country.