Culture
The opera composer Vincenzo Bellini was born in Catania, and a museum exists at his birthplace. The Teatro Massimo "Vincenzo Bellini", which opened in 1890, is named after the composer. The opera house presents a variety of operas through a season, which run from December to May, many of which are the work of Bellini.
Giovanni Verga was born in Catania in 1840. He became the greatest writer of Verismo, an Italian literary movement akin to Naturalism. His novels portray life among the lower levels of Sicilan society, such as fishermen and stonemasons, and were written in a mixture of both literary language and local dialect. Francesco Longo Mancini was a painter known for paintings of nudes who was born in Catania in 1880.
The city is base of the newspaper La Sicilia and of the TV-channel Antenna Sicilia also known as Sicilia Channel. Several others local television channels and free-press magazines have their headquarters in Catania.
In the late 1980s and during the 1990s Catania had a sparkling and unique popular music scene. Indie pop and indie rock bands, local radio station and dynamic independent music record labels sprung. As a result, in those years the city experienced a vital and effervescent cultural period. Artists like Carmen Consoli and Mario Venuti and internationally known indie rock bands like Uzeda came out of this cultural milieu.
The city is the home of Amatori Catania rugby union team, Calcio Catania football team and Orizzonte Catania, the latter being a brilliant women's water polo club, winning eight European Champions Cup titles from 1994 to 2008. Noted Italian basketball coach Ettore Messina is a native of Catania. The city also hosted the first ever qualification tournament for the Rugby World Cup Sevens in 1992, and the associated Etna Cup, which was won by the host Sicily team. In addition, the Catania Elephants are currently members of the Italian Football League.
The city's patron saint is Saint Agatha, who is celebrated with a religious pageantry, the Festival of Saint Agatha, on February 5 every year.
Catania also hosted the 2011 FIE Fencing World Championships.
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Famous quotes containing the word culture:
“The treatment of African and African American culture in our education was no different from their treatment in Tarzan movies.”
—Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)
“Here in the U.S., culture is not that delicious panacea which we Europeans consume in a sacramental mental space and which has its own special columns in the newspapers—and in people’s minds. Culture is space, speed, cinema, technology. This culture is authentic, if anything can be said to be authentic.”
—Jean Baudrillard (b. 1929)
“Ours is a culture based on excess, on overproduction; the result is a steady loss of sharpness in our sensory experience. All the conditions of modern life—its material plenitude, its sheer crowdedness—conjoin to dull our sensory faculties.”
—Susan Sontag (b. 1933)