Italy's Culture Ministry launches #aida150 campaign for Verdi opera's 150th anniversary

The Italian Ministry of Culture (MiC) has launched #aida150, a digital campaign celebrating the 150th anniversary of Giuseppe Verdi's opera Aida. The opera premiered at the Khedivial Opera House in Cairo on December 24, 1871, with its European debut at Milan's Teatro alla Scala on February 8, 1872. The campaign runs until February 8, 2022, sharing archival materials on MiC's social media channels, including set designs, costume sketches, posters, letters, musical drafts, and scores from state archives, libraries, theaters, and museums. Highlights include Verdi's autograph documents from the Italian State Archives, musical sketches from the State Archive of Parma, personal letters and iconographic material from the Ricordi Historical Archive (including Girolamo Magnani's set designs for the 1872 Milan premiere and Attilio Comelli's costume designs for the 1906 Milan production), correspondence between Verdi, the Ricordi family, and librettist Antonio Ghislanzoni, period posters from the Salce Museum in Treviso, and librettos from the Cairo premiere in Italian, French, and Arabic from the National Institute of Verdi Studies in Parma. On March 17, 2022, celebrations culminate with the exhibition "Aida figlia di due mondi" at the Museo Egizio in Turin, exploring the opera's historical context.