Parma Italian Capital of Culture 2020+21

What is culture?... All that leads to the production of art, good food, music or may be what art, good food, great and beautiful music produce?

One way or another, in Parma, culture is encountered, experienced in the squares, in the streets, galleries, museums and exhibitions, in the craft shops and opulent delicatessen, in the theaters and cathedrals, in the intimate restaurants and taverns, in the street food bistros.

Even more in the years that see it as the Italian Capital of Culture, it will be surprising to walk its streets, its places of culture and find on the path unexpected artistic treasures, exquisite food and sublime music. All in a  welcoming and elegant city, away from the crowds, traffic and queues, in spaces on a human scale and ideal for an easy and correct social distancing.

From the elegant Ducal Park, to the amazing wooden Teatro Farnese, to the important National Gallery, to the moving composure and integrity of Cathedral Square with the imposing medieval Cathedral and the Baptistery in pink marble, to the refined neoclassicism of the Teatro Regio, temple of Italian Opera, you will only want to stop for a coffee or a typical snack in an outdoor café in a park or under the pergola of an ancient trattoria or comfortably sitting in an elegant square of the historical center.

In Parma you will find the great cultural traditions, there is the contemporary and the fine arts of the past … Here important artists and personalities were born and lived. And they of course left a great cultural heritage. Giuseppe Verdi, one of the greatest musicians ever and Arturo Toscanini  were born here. We had great art masters like Antelami, Correggio and Parmigianino, we had typographers and publishers like GianBattista Bodoni and Franco Maria Ricci, a film director like Bernardo Bertolucci”.

In Parma you find the heritages of great families like Farnese and Borbone, if you walk a few hundred meters in the city center, you will cross centuries of history …

That’s why Parma in 2021, while being the Italian Capital of Culture, will celebrate its most important artists and personalities with innovative Art Exhibitions,  an important  music calendar and a rich cultural program.

So walking in the streets, arriving in the square of the Cathedral and Baptistery and in Saint John Church that host masterpieces by Antelami, Correggio and Parmigianino, you will find the exhibition “Antelami a Parma. Il lavoro dell’uomo, il tempo della terra” devoted to the great medieval sculptor and architect Benedetto Antelami. 

If you walk to the Pilotta Palace that hosts the amazing wooden unique Farnese Theater and important National Gallery with the paintings by Correggio and Parmigianino and others among which a beautiful Da Vinci, you will encounter the exhibition devoted to Correggio and Parmigianino “L’Alchimia della Grazia” or the exhibition devoted to Farnese Family (“I Farnese, Architettura Arte Potere”).

These are only some examples inside the rich art exhibition calendar in program in the city and in the province.

Finally the music at the  elegant neo-classical Teatro Regio considered one of the Italian temples of Opera. Together with the Fondazione Arturo Toscanini, it  offers a rich, all year long music calendar. We start from the Teatro Regio Opera Season and the Concert Season of la Toscanini, then the Festival Toscanini to arrive to the end of June. Then the summer music events and  finally our beloved, prestigious and award-winning Festival Verdi which in 2020 celebrated its twentieth anniversary.

To enrich the possibilities, in the hills and in the plane, there are beautiful castles, villas, museums and of course exclusive food experiences  about Parmigiano Reggiano, Prosciutto di Parma , Culatello di Zibello, Vini dei Colli wines …

Last but not least, Verdi’s Land, where it is possible to retrace the whole life of the great musician.  From his humble Birth House to  Villa Verdi, the country house that Verdi built for himself, to Barezzi House Museum,  to the small beautiful Teatro Verdi that always hosts an Opera during Festival Verdi, to the Giuseppe Verdi National Museum and the Renata Tebaldi Museum devoted to this great Verdi Music interpreter

So we can say that Parma will offer intense proposals for unforgettable itineraries.

Discover our tour and enjoy Parma 2020+21, the Italian Capital of Culture.

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