A Street Covered in Handmade Blankets
In Italy, the National Day of Palliative Care is celebrated on 11 November.
This year I will spend the whole month of November in my hometown, Padova, visiting my family and holding a lecture in my former university, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice.
Not only I am glad to get a break from the dark Swedish winter, but also I love to immerse as much as I can in the local art scene. The last time I was in Padova, I wrote an article about the Madonna of the Filthy Water. That article was very appreciated, not only by readers but also the artist himself, which I had the chance to meet last week for a very pleasant aperitivo — a traditional pre-dinner drink.
This would not have happened if I did not take the leap and write about local art here on Medium, therefore I’ve decided to make a series out of all the amazing art displays I have the privilege of seeing on a daily basis when I am at home.
The first article of this series will be dedicated to what I call “the blanket street”. I found this street by chance today while looking for a parking spot with my sister.
Actually, it is not really the street that is covered in unique, hand-made blankets, but rather, the perimetrical walls of a hospice called Casa Santa Chiara. According to their website, the total length of the blanket is over 196 meters.
But why is the whole street decorated with blankets?
Founded in 1994 and run by nuns (suore francescane elisabettiane), Casa Santa Chiara was initially a residence for AIDS patients. Today, it is a hospice specialising in palliative care.
Palliative care is a type of specialized medical care for people living with a serious, often terminal, illness. This type of care is focused on providing relief from the symptoms and stress of the illness. The goal is to improve the quality of life of patients and their families, especially when it comes to end-of-life treatments.
Etymologically, ‘palliative’ comes from the Latin word pallium, which means cloak. With this installation, the hospice wanted to raise awareness over the importance of palliative care, by using these blankets to figuratively cover not only the patients, their families, and friends, but also the city of Padova and its inhabitants.
In Italy, the National Day for Palliative Care (November 11) was chosen so that it would coincide with St. Martin Day, a very popular saint who was born in modern-day Poland from pagan parents and lived during the IV century.
St. Martin was the bishop of the French city of Tours, and he is considered the founder of monasticism in France. He is particularly famous for a story according to which he gave half of his cloak to a beggar he encountered during a particularly cold day.
According to the legend, soon after this episode, the sky cleared up, and the temperature became milder. The Summer of St. Martin indicates a possible autumn period in which, after the first frosts, climatic conditions of good weather and relative warmth occur. In the southern hemisphere the phenomenon is observed in late April – early May, while in the northern hemisphere in early November.
In Venice, children help bake (or receive as a gift) a traditional highly decorated cookie that is shaped as the saint on his horse.
Outside the Venetian main islands, in the hinterland of the Municipality of Venice, St. Martin (San Martino) is celebrated by reviving traditions linked to the so-called “peasant New Year”, for example by consuming chestnuts and wine in the streets.
In the agricultural world, in fact, the feast of San Martino is linked to the tradition, in this period, of tapping the new wine of the vintage from the barrels. Hence the saying “a San Martino ogni mosto diventa vino” (“on San Martino day, every must becomes wine”).
I really loved this colourful installation, which also served an important purpose: without seeing this unusual display of blankets, I wouldn’t have known that behind those walls palliative care was provided to so many people suffering.
