When you think about a labyrinth, some stories and movies come immediately to mind. Everyone may automatically think of the Minotaur and the thread of Arianna or the maze of the fourth Harry Potter film or imagines the mind one of Inception. However generally confusion and disorientation are always there with the difficulty of finding the way out.
The largest LABYRINTH in the world is in ITALY
In Italy there is both the most difficult labyrinth in the world, that one of Villa Pisani in Stra (in the metropolitan city of Venice), and the largest in the world: the Labyrinth of the Masone in Fontanellato, in Emilia Romagna. If the maze of Stra is quite old, in Stra it is said that even Napoleon could not find the solution, the labyrinth of Fontanellato is quite new.
# The labyrinth of the Masone is one of the last works of Franco Maria Ricci
The Labyrinth of the Masone
In Fontanellato, in the province of Parma, the Masone Maze was inaugurated in 2015 and was designed by Franco Maria Ricci. For 12 years, 200,000 bamboo trees of different species (30 centimeters and 15 meters high) were planted. In the end the labyrinth occupied 8 hectares of area and became the largest maze in the world.
Ricci followed a passion he had since childhood: “I loved labyrinths as a child. Then they settled and, at a certain moment, they came back out” says the artist, who also wanted to keep the promise made to the Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges. The place has all the charm of the labyrinth, the fear of getting lost between crossroads and dead ends and the hope of finding your way back.
# A cultural park
The Labyrinth of the Masone
In addition to the maze, in the park there is a museum, a space for temporary exhibitions, a library and an archive. In fact, everything is part of a wider cultural project linked to Franco Maria Ricci. The museum houses about 500 works from the artist’s collection, while the library contains all the books published by Ricci over the past 50 years, as well as his library collections. At the same time, there is a bar and a bristot that offer the pleasures of Parmesan cuisine.
# The Labyrinth of the Masone is part of a historic town
Fontanellato
The Labyrinth of the Masone is in Fontanellato, a town with some awards. The village is “Bandiera Arancione” (award of the Touring Club given to Italian small towns), it is also City of Art and Culture, Cittaslow and City of good living and good food. Among the beauties of the town you surely find the Rocca San Vitale, a fortress dating back to the 11th century that is still surrounded by a moat full of water, even if the drawbridge has been replaced by a masonry one. Today the Rocca is the municipal seat. In the centre you can also admire the old 19th century drawbridges, a proof that Fontanellato has great historical importance.
BEATRICE BARAZZETTI
