Vittorio Mazzucconi - Fondazione

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immagine istituzionale della Fondazione - particolare de 'Il lavoro spirituale' opera di Vittorio Mazzucconi

The Vittorio Mazzucconi
Foundation

The Convivio
Philosophical dialogue conducted by Vittorio Mazzucconi
2009-2012


What is the "Convivio"? It is a commitment to spiritual research and its sharing, carried on with two quarterly seminars per year, in spring and autumn, thus being in harmony with seasons, nature and ourselves. Each seminar includes a dozen meetings, which always take place on Wednesday in our Foundation, in Via Andrea Ponti 1, Milan. After a first greeting of aperitif, from 19.30 onwards, the next conference at 20.30 and the debate, our evenings continue with a convivial dinner, which is part of the Convivio's intent to share the nourishment of knowledge , friendship, and even, frugally, food. The meetings that are conducted by Vittorio Mazzucconi, with the participation of the attending the seminar and sometimes of invited speakers, do not follow a pre-arranged program, but a creative and spontaneous journey.

The work we do:
Spring 2009	THE SPIRITUAL WORK In the face of the growing disorder of the contemporary world, Vittorio Mazzucconi seeks to contribute to the search for a new orientation, in our conscience and in our works, as a service of man. The seminar was articulated in a series of meetings on the city, architecture, art, accompanied by philosophical reflection aimed at finding its spiritual foundation. In particular, the idea is to rebuild the city, with the renewal of the man who can make it possible. Applying to such great subjects, obviously only a first effort has been made, which demands to be continued and expanded, but which shows the path of a true and fundamental experience.

autumn 2009	ART AND PSYCHE A further study was devoted to art, identified with the perennial theme of the soul, read through another channel of Vittorio Mazzucconi's experience: painting. With it, we break away from the ephemeral world of contemporary art, largely corrupted by ideologies, protagonists and market, to look only at the inner life, which is the true value of man. Art can thus become a means of knowing oneself.

Spring 2010	FEELING AND REASON In a subsequent seminary, the work continued in other forms about man, his soul, his works, his path. We have investigated the two poles of our being, between which our lives are woven. We did not talk only about the inner life of heart and mind, but about a much wider set, which has been read on different levels: first, in the relationship between body, soul, and spirit; hence in light and darkness, life and death, female and male, Yin and Yang. In a further map, moreover, we saw similar relationships in history, culture and religion, while in our time we are faced with the break of balance between the two poles. We must therefore work to contribute to the achievement of a new equilibrium, in ourselves and in the world. It is the "Spiritual Work" with which the "CONVIVIO" started but where shall we begin? What does it consist of?

autumn 2010	KNOW THYSELF Since this precept has been written at the entrance to the Delphi's Sanctuary, the man has been questioning its meaning. It can be explored on different levels, from that of our personal characteristics that everyone can try to realize, to the higher one of what it means to be a man. It means to ask: who is man? Who am I? The answer we have been looking for can only open up further and deeper issues, for self-seeking is an infinite field. There is also a higher meaning than that of being a man, and it is to discover in ourselves the "treasure of the gods" that is concealed in us. To reveal it is the true knowledge.

Spring 2011	KNOWLEDGE AND LOVE But the ordinary knowledge applied to the sciences and the set of time-consuming culture is quite different. It is only a product of reason itself, its attachment to matter, and ultimately the absence of love. To the resemblance of union between body and soul, true knowledge must be a union between the reason that all explores and the feeling that hears and expresses deep meaning. It is the love that works this union, generating life, and it does it at every level, up to the supreme level of return to divine unity.

autumn 2011	COSCIOUSNESS What Is Consciousness? A purely sensory fact or something that goes beyond, in the sphere of the soul? We also know that there are different levels of consciousness, from that of less developed animals or even matter to that of human consciousness, but if we open a soul survey, is there a further stage we can guess? In addition to being a mirror to our inner life, consciousness is formed in the relationship, with an ethical and civil development that, extensively, extends to all humanity at a time. Lastly, there is the opposite of consciousness or absence: is the unconscious spoken of by psychoanalysis? Is all that in the world is not conscious or that we feel like that? Or is our habitual condition to be in a state of sleep, not awareness, from which we must awaken? On awakening, we will be conscious not only of our person and the world we live in, but of our true and spiritual Being. It is to this that leads the path to a true development of consciousness.

Spring 2012	HARMONY In a time like ours, where are so strong the contradictions and the explosive tendencies in which man is dissociated, and he is no longer believing to the great visions of philosophy, religion or art, is so difficult to talk about harmony. But it is also necessary to do so, with the intent of bringing these divergences and shortcomings back to an order, to a sense. It will certainly not be something static and immutable as it was believed in the past, but a push to rebalance the disorder that afflicts us on all planes, to heal the rupture above all in ourselves, to believe in beauty, in truth, in love. An utopia? No, we are talking about an inner orientation that not only can oppose what appears to be negative but it can absorb it and finalize it to the achievement of a new and dynamic harmony.

autumn 2012	THE BODY AND THE SOUL In all the previous seminars, we have talked a lot about the soul, but does it make sense today, to talk about the soul? In the secular culture, or in the materialism of our time, the soul is denied as God is denied. Let's then talk about the body, of which we have never diminished the importance: just remember the seminary and the book ARTE E PSICHE to see that the way of the soul is accomplished through eros, that is bodily love, with all its strength. Does anyway have a sense to distinguish between body and soul? Even believing in their duality, it is evident that it is composed in the reality of the person, in which body and soul are united, although their union ends and dissolves with death. How, then, do not wonder if, beyond this event, there is something at a higher and deeper level that manifests itself through it, and what is its purpose and essence?

Spring 2013	TO BE AND TO EXIST Does it make sense to distinguish between essence and existence? A distinction that will appear unfounded to those who do not believe there is a being, just as he thinks there is no soul or God. This threefold denial shows us at least that being, soul, and God are the same, even though we live their equivalent only in the existence, in the body, and in the matter. All these aspects are however united in life, as they will be divided into death, but not forever. Existence flows to being as well as being has flowed into life when we were born. Being and existence are then flowing into each other, like Yin and Yang. And as these are Tao manifestations, so, calling it in western terms the One, we will think it is above their cyclicity. Is it insuperable, alas, the distance between the One and our little mortal lives? No, the distance is canceled whenever the being and the existence merge: does it happen in extraordinary men, in extraordinary works? No, it happens in every flower and indeed everywhere, in every moment ...

Information All the seminars have been recorded. Their texts have been published or are under publications. For more details click on their titles, or on the Bookshop. Published books: "The Spiritual Work", Moretti & Vitali 2010, "Art and Psyche", Mimesis 2012, "Feeling and reason", Mimesis, 2013, To be and to exist", Mimesis, 2015. Books under publication: (also as e-books) "Know thyself", "Knowledge and love", "Cosciousness", "Harmony", "The Body and the soul"(The Luogo of the Cascata, 2017-18)