Friday 29 May, h 9:00 p.m.
Friday 29 May, h 9:00 p.m.
Palazzo Gromo Losa
DocBi, A COMMON GOOD: a common good for the common good
Not a celebration, but an exploration. Not a list of achievements, but a mosaic of stories. To mark its 40th anniversary, DocBi – Centro Studi Biellesi presents the new documentary by director Manuele Cecconello, dedicated to the mission of an association which, through constant and selfless work, has become a cultural and identity-defining institution in the Biella area.
The film deliberately eschews a chronological account of DocBi’s forty years and unfolds instead through seven key words – WOOL, EARTH, SOUL, ART, TIME, BODY, WRITING – each linked to a symbolic place in the Biella area. From the Fabbrica della Ruota to the Upper Valsessera, from Bessa to Oropa and on to the association’s new headquarters, an emotional and cultural map takes shape, showing how the preservation of heritage is an act of cultural resistance capable of making the past fertile ground for the future.
At the heart of the story lies the rediscovery of the 18th-century sculptor Giovanni Mainoldo and his *Madonna del Carmine* in Trivero, a symbol of the pursuit of beauty as a common good and a metaphor for DocBi’s very mission: to connect a community through its identities.
Guided by the narration of Paolo Zanone, the viewer is taken through evocative images, previously unseen archive material and testimonies from the key figures who have shaped the association’s history.
“The aim was not to create a self-congratulatory documentary,” explains Cecconello, “but to transform forty years of meticulous work into a universal experience. DocBi40 is more than a film: it is the story of a collective endeavour that has succeeded in transforming archives, trails, flavours and works of art into a living, shared heritage, demonstrating how culture can strengthen a community’s sense of belonging.”
Free admission subject to availability