*lifted from the official press release of the group
The
De La Salle - College of Saint Benilde (DLS-CSB) commemorates Dante Alighieri’s
750th birth anniversary by’s staging his epic poem “Divine Comedy,”
with special focus on the “Purgatorio” on Friday the 13th of November
from 1:30 pm to 6:00 pm.
Titled “Purgatory: Love Gone
Wrong/Love Redeemed,” the five-hour production is a multi-genre series of
site-specific performances and installations at the De La Salle -College of St.
Benilde’s from 1:30 pm to 6:00 pm.
DLS-CSB President Brother Dennis
Magbanua, FSC, said “our production of Purgatory: Love Gone Wrong/Love Redeemed
is intended to instill an appreciation and deeper embodied understanding of
Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy.”
“As an innovative and inclusive
college, the Benilde community benefits from this project by finding relevance
in this medieval masterpiece as a way of understanding personal struggles and
yearnings for spiritual rebirth amid the urban blight and congestion and the
seduction of consumerism,” said Magbanua, who plays the role of Angelos,
Dante’s messenger of joy who guides him to Heaven.
“With this long vibrant afternoon
presentation, the DLS-CSB affirms its place in creative excellence, innovative
performance design, and the inclusion of three Benilde campuses, and the
community at large,” Magbanua said.
Benilde School of Design and
Arts Dean Jose Maria U. Yupangco, who is playing the role of Dante, said
“Purgatory explores and grapples with the excesses of love and its eventual
righteous temperance through movement, music, theater, and co-splay pageantry.”
“The production is part of a series
of events undertaken in collaboration with the Societa Dante Alighieri Manila,
which promotes Italian culture and language in the country,” Yupangco said.
The journey to purgatory will take
the participants to the different locations within and floors of the School of
Design and Arts building-campus.
The seven deadly sins of pride,
envy, wrath, sloth, avarice, gluttony, and lust are interpreted through
installations and performance art by the faculty and students from the degree
programs of theater, dance, music, design foundation, production design,
multimedia and fashion.
Benilde
School of Design and the Arts Associate Dean Sunita S. Mukhi said that “the
production is based on Dante’s magnum opus The Divine Comedy, which is considered
pivotal in world literature and a masterpiece of writing in the Italian
language.”
Mukhi, who is lead creator of the
production, said among the “highlights of the journey through purgatory are the
student and faculty co-splay parade along the streets of Leon Guinto and Pablo
Ocampo led by Dean Yupangco, a capella chants and music instrumentations by the
Coro San Benildo, and a movement piece by the deaf dancers of the School of
Deaf Education and Applied Studies and those of the Romancon Dance Company, the
SDA’s dance program.”
Associate Dean Asela Domingo plays
the role of Faith, Associate Dean Abigail Cabanilla is Hope, and Vice
Chancellor for La Sallian Mission and Student Life Carmelita Lazatin is
Charity.
The DLS-CSB’s Purgatory is part of
the bigger Dante commemoration participated in by UP Diliman, Ateneo, San Juan
de Letran, Lyceum University in Intramuros, University of Asia and the Pacific,
and by the De La Salle University - Taft, among others.
About 150 members of the the
DLS-CSB’s various departments and programs are taking part in the production.
Members of the Italian diplomatic
community are expected to attend the event.
The Benilde Dante Project is led by
the DLS-CSB School of Design and the Arts’ Culture and Arts Cluster. Together with it are the SDA
cluster in New Media, Fashion Design department, the Office of Arts and
Culture, School of Deaf Education and Applied Studies, School of Hotel,
Restaurant and Institution Management, the School of Multidisciplinary Studies,
the School of Management and Information Technology, and the Benilde Pep Squad.
For more information on how to visit DLS-CSB on Nov. 13,
please contact the SDA Dean’s office at 2305100 loc 3812 or via email at benildedanteproject@gmail.com.
To learn more about the other Dante Today initiatives of
the Societa Dante Alighieri Manila, please visit their Facebook page.
